


Nor the Suns Themselves Brighter

by glimmerglanger



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mechanic Anakin Skywalker, Post-Order 66, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-09
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:35:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23559220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glimmerglanger/pseuds/glimmerglanger
Summary: Everything interesting in the desert happened at night, at least in Anakin’s experience. The temperatures dropped with the setting of the suns and the darkness crept in, covering acts that would be revealed under Tatooine’s harsh daylight. Considering what people were willing to do in the light, the night hours were a dangerous time to be about.Anakin was one of the many factors that made them so.(AU where Qui-Gon never took Anakin off of Tatooine)OR, the one where Anakin gets a ready-made family dropped on him and handles the situation far better than anticipated.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 176
Kudos: 1633
Collections: Star Wars





	Nor the Suns Themselves Brighter

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: [【授翻】耀如双日/Nor the Suns Themselves Brighter（by glimmerglanger）](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23856376) by [Transatlanticism_1015](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Transatlanticism_1015/pseuds/Transatlanticism_1015)



Everything interesting in the desert happened at night, at least in Anakin’s experience. The temperatures dropped with the setting of the suns and the darkness crept in, covering acts that would be revealed under Tatooine’s harsh daylight. Considering what people were willing to do in the light, the night hours were a dangerous time to be about.

Anakin was one of the many factors that made them so.

He preferred the shadows to the blinding light, and, besides, most of his associates only came out at night. He was in the dunes outside of Mos Espa the evening the ship came down, waiting to move a shipment of spice he’d come into. He watched the blazing red light streak down across the night sky - a ship, tumbling, out of control down into the sand - and thought about ignoring it, but only for a moment.

It had Republic markings. He’d seen them through his macrobinoculars. He didn’t really care  _ why  _ a Republic ship would be crashing on Tatooine, of all places. The thing had come down hot, but the dunes had a tendency to grant soft landings. Some of it might be salvageable, worth more than a few packs of low-grade spice.

Anakin loaded up his little speed-bike, designed to run fast and quiet, and slung a leg over, settling his goggles into place. He could hear, in the night, the rumble of other engines starting up. He wasn’t the only scavenger in these hills.

Just the fastest.

He grinned, pulling his collar up over his nose and mouth, and leaned forward over the bike, giving the engines exactly what they wanted.

#

The Republic ship was unmolested, when Anakin found her. She’d landed on her side, half-buried in the sand. Smoke poured out of her aft, but she looked in better condition than he’d hoped. The pilot had done a better than expected job bringing her down.

Anakin needed to get that smoke taken care of, before he worried about anything else. He’d gotten to her first by tracking it. Best not to give others the same flag. If she really were in good shape, he wouldn’t have to take back only parts. If he could get her operational again, bring her back for sale….

Well.

Maybe he’d finally have enough credits to get off this kriffing rock.

It took the work of a minute to cover the damaged area of the ship, trapping the smoke for the moment. He raised a hand and concentrated, just enough to nudge the smoke in the air further away. He’d always been able to do that, move small things, nudge the world a little bit, here and there.

His mother had made him promise, long ago, never to show anyone. It was dangerous, she said, after the Jedi left, swearing to return for him. The man never had. Anakin shook those thoughts away, scanning around the dunes briefly.

No one else had yet approached. Maybe he could coax the ship into movement, get her away, somewhere quiet where he could work on the damage. He scrambled up the side of the craft, to the entry hatch. The controls sparked at his touch, and he cursed them, under his breath, shaking out his stinging fingers.

He’d never had much experience with Republic tech. They didn’t come this way frequently, but he’d seen pieces here and there in the market. He’d dabbled. And, besides, he’d always had an accord with machines. “Come on, come on,” he murmured, coaxing the panel open, plucking at wires until, with a grinding sound, the door opened.

The inside of the ship was full of smoke. It billowed out through the door, along with a wave of heat. Maybe she wasn’t in as good shape as he’d hoped, he thought, slipping inside with an arm over his mouth. 

Flames licked towards the back of the compartment, spreading faster with the onrush of oxygen. Anakin scowled, looking around. There were strange, dark smears here and there, over the walls and floor. He dragged a finger through the closest, and his skin came away wet and red. Blood.

He ignored the flames for the moment. He needed to get a look at the cockpit, find out how badly she was broke. He moved forward, pulling himself into the compartment, intending to look at the sparking controls.

The pilot caught his attention, instead. He was curled against the side of the ship, limp. He wore robes; they’d probably been tan once. Mostly they were stained dark, currently. Dark and wet. Blood was splattered up his neck, across the visible side of his face.

No doubt he’d been hurt in the crash, but Anakin didn’t think  _ all  _ of his injuries had come from the harsh landing. Not unless the ship had shot him full of blaster holes during the descent. Anakin would have liked to pretend the man was dead, but knew he wasn’t. He could always tell that, too. The man lived, though not by much.

And he wasn’t the only thing living on the ship. He held, impossibly, a child. An infant, by the look of it, squirmed against him.

Anakin looked away from him, jaw clenched hard. The controls were fritzing on and off, but this ship was a score, the score he’d been waiting for so long. He could put out the fire, hide her, fix her or take her apart, get the credits he needed….

“Why couldn’t you have been dead?” Anakin grumbled, climbing further into the cockpit. He took the infant, a child that gurgled and waved arms in the arm. Anakin sighed, carrying the baby out to his speeder and then returning. He reached to unlatch the pilot’s restraints. He didn’t even twitch when Anakin worked an arm around him and dragged him up.

Someone had slapped a few bandages on him, dragging aside his robes to do so. Anakin got a look at him and grimaced. The bandages were bled through, long ago. The man was probably going to die  _ anyway _ . Anakin pulled him out of the ship, cursing himself for a fool the whole time.

But his mother hadn’t raised him to leave a man to die, cold and alone in the desert.

Anakin dragged the pilot out into the open air, coughing raggedly as he did. The ship was full of smoke and flames, heat radiating through her hull. He was going to lose the whole thing, at this rate. He ground his teeth together in frustration, finally able to lift the man properly.

He was shorter than Anakin, but a solid weight in his arms, nothing but muscle and bone. Anakin scowled down at him, briefly, at pale skin smeared with blood, and sighed. There was nothing else to be done but to carry him over to the speeder, to warn, “This ride isn’t going to be very much fun for you.”

The man didn’t reply, didn’t stir when Anakin loaded him onto the small trailer attached to the back of the speeder, amongst the spice. Hopefully he wouldn’t ruin it all by bleeding on it. Anakin took off his cloak, covering the man with it, and strapping him in. The infant Anakin held, tucking the child close to protect him from the wind.

The pilot would probably be dead by the time they got back to Anakin’s rooms.

#

The man  _ wasn’t  _ dead by the time Anakin got the infant safely hidden in his rooms, the speeder hidden, and unstrapped him. He was still breathing, weakly, somehow. Anakin was almost impressed, in spite of himself. He lifted the man again, slipping away, off into an alley towards his rooms.

No one looked twice at him carrying a body. It wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where you wanted to know why someone was carrying a body.

Anakin deactivated his security systems with one hand, his other keeping the man across his shoulders steady. He slipped into his rooms with one last look over his shoulder, despite the fact that he couldn’t feel anyone near-by. His senses weren’t always accurate. He reached towards the scar on his face at the thought, and stopped before he reached it.

The inside of his rooms were over-warm, even in the middle of the night. He scowled, nudging the door closed, resetting all the alarms and defenses. It was dim inside, lit only by a droid recharging station. He hit the lights, ignoring the beeping questions of his droids as he made his way further inside.

He didn’t have much space and most of it was full of projects, components, salvage. He had a cot, in the back of the rooms, that he rarely managed to sleep on. He took the pilot there, pushing a pile of tangled wires off of the mattress with a foot and then bending to deposit the man.

He was still alive. He’d bled all over Anakin’s shirt, and didn’t look sorry about it.

“Alright,” Anakin said, frowning at him, impressed a bit, despite himself, at how fiercely this man was clinging to life. “Let’s get you patched up then, huh?”

After all, the ship had probably been a wash, anyway. Fires like that almost always meant the engines were burning inside. The flames would spread fast, ruining all the parts worth anything, just leaving metal and scraps.

Maybe the pilot would be worth something. Anakin snorted at the thought, pushing aside robes and tunics. He ended up frowning a little more with each inch of skin he revealed. “Sithspit,” he hissed, staring at no less than three blaster injuries and a roadmap of scars, “what happened to  _ you _ ?”

He got no answer, not as he cut away the tunics - it was far less trouble than trying to wrestle them off of the pilot - and not as he cleaned the wounds. Two of the blaster shots had gone clean through. The other hadn’t. Anakin had no idea if any had hit an organ, but the man was barely bleeding anymore.

The blood Anakin mopped off of his gut was terribly dark, though. Anakin knew enough to know  _ that  _ was a bad sign. The man laid there, on his cot, barely breathing, pale and freckled and scarred, and Anakin  _ knew  _ a few med patches weren’t going to see him right.

“Kriffing hell.” He scrubbed a hand over his mouth and stood, banging a fist on the side of the door as he headed to his comm-unit. He’d gone out to the ship to  _ make  _ a few credits, but this trip was getting more and more expensive by the moment.

#

Medics, actual medics, with schooling and training, weren’t available to people like Anakin. He called M’d’gal’vel, who he’d worked with once or twice, and who knew how to put people back together so that mostly they didn’t die.

She showed up quickly - she’d have better, for the credits he’d promised her - and barely even glanced at him. He didn’t know exactly what species she was; he didn’t think she did, either. Her mother had been Twi’lek, though. She said, “Where’s this man, then?” and Anakin led her back through the rooms.

He’d done his best to keep the pilot alive, elevating his legs, putting pressure bandages on the wounds. She looked over his work with an arched eyebrow. “Well?” Anakin asked, “can you fix him, or not?”

She glanced up at him, dark eyes narrowed. “Maybe,” she said, but she set down the bag of supplies she’d brought along and unwrapped the scarf from her face. “He’s lost a lot of blood. I don’t have that.”

Anakin glanced over at the man, so pale and still, and sighed. This night kept getting better and kriffing better. “Use mine,” he said, “he looks human. Mine should work.” It wasn’t easy as that, he knew. He’d been told, long ago, that his blood was supposed to be compatible with most humans, but they’d spread to so many different worlds, sometimes it wouldn’t work out that way.

If they didn’t try, the guy looked like he’d die anyway, so Anakin obediently sat beside the bed and stretched out his arm, barely feeling the pinch inside his elbow. As far as hurts went, it barely registered. “Clench and unclench your fist,” she said, and Anakin nodded, staring at the far wall, imagining his credits flowing out, just like his blood, as she worked.

#

M’d’gal’vel left with a tremendous chunk of his credits, a few hours later. Anakin saw her off, holding a bandage to the inside of his arm and feeling dizzy. The pilot hadn’t started seizing when exposed to his blood. He was still alive, cleaned up, mostly, and patched back together.

Anakin went back to look at him, holding the infant - he’d had to go out and purchase supplies for the kid - for lack of anything better to do. M’d’gal’vel had left him flat on his back, uncovered. Anakin leaned against the doorframe. The man was nothing but scars and flesh stretched thin over muscle and bone. He didn’t look like he’d seen enough to eat for some time. He looked like he hurt, even asleep. There were strands of white in his copper hair.

The freckles across his shoulders and chest seemed out of place, somehow. Anakin had thought they were blood spatters, at first, and tried to rub a few off. But they were just soft marks on his soft skin.

Anakin shook his head, drifting closer and sitting on the edge of the cot. He pushed the man’s hair back, getting a better look at him. There was also the matter of the weapon Anakin had found on his belt. He knew very well what the cylinder was. So, after all this time, the Jedi  _ had  _ come back to Tatooine, though this wasn’t the one he’d met, so many years ago.

Anakin looked at his face, frowning. The Jedi had brought him nothing but heartache. And, well...

He knew damn well there was a bounty on their heads. Word had filtered out fast from the Core, even to Tatooine. He stood, stiffly, not looking at the little bandage on the man’s arm, where Anakin’s blood had gone into him.

Maybe the night didn’t have to be a total waste, he thought, turning aside and hesitating, still holding a wriggling child. He shifted back, grabbing the blanket at the end of the bed and pulling it up over the man’s body. He should just… put in a call.

The bounty had said dead or alive, so they wouldn’t mind this one’s condition. It was the smart thing to do.

Anakin thumped his fist against the doorframe, walked out of the room, and went to go tinker. He needed to keep his hands busy, and, anyway, he had nowhere to sleep.

#

It took three days for the man to wake up. Anakin left him sleeping, venturing back out to the wreck to find it mostly picked over. He scowled. No good deed went unpunished, but he’d learned that long ago, suffering through Watto’s retribution for his actions in the podrace after the Jedi left him behind.

He picked through what was left, found a few parts that seemed worthwhile, and went back. He changed the bag of fluid left behind by M’d’gal’vel, and wondered if the man would just waste away and die.

Anakin didn’t think so. No one clung to life through all of whatever this guy had gone through just to die when they were finally getting some medical attention. Still, Anakin was beginning to doubt by the third day, when he finally heard faint noises from the room.

He grabbed a blaster before heading back the hall. The man didn’t look like he was going to be putting up a fight, but they said the Jedi had all gone mad. They said they were willing to kill anyone who got in their way. They said they were a threat to the Republic itself.

Anakin doubted that, but he had reason enough of his own not to trust them.

He found the man trying to sit, pushed up on one elbow and breathing hard. “Hey,” Anakin said, jerking forward, because like hell was he going to let this man pull all his injuries open again, not after he’d spent so much of his savings getting them shut. “What are you doing? Lie back down.”

The man jerked, looking at him, and Anakin froze in his tracks.

The Jedi had the bluest eyes Anakin had ever seen, like Tatooine’s sky on a clear morning, before it got impossibly hot outside. Currently, those eyes were wide, full of confusion and no small amount of pain. The man rasped, “What…?”

“I said lie back down,” Anakin said, shaking himself, pushing forward again. The man stared at him, so Anakin put a hand on his shoulder - no longer so cold - and gave him a push. “You’re hurt, idiot, you can’t be moving around.”

“No,” the man said, pushing back against Anakin’s hand, shaking his head. “No, the child--”

“He’s fine,” Anakin said. The kid seemed fine, anyway. Anakin didn’t know anything about kids, but he mostly just ate, dirtied his diapers, and slept. “Listen, what’s your name? I need something to call you.”

The pilot stared at him for a moment. “He’s not hurt?”

“Doing better than you are, friend,” Anakin said. “Now, about that name?”

“I - I have to go.” The man tried to press up against his hold again. “It’s -- not safe. My ship--”

“Is currently in pieces,” Anakin said, snorting. It wasn’t actually difficult to push the man back down. Anakin hadn’t lost most of his blood a few days ago. “Spread across half of Tatooine by now.”

The man blinked at him; his eyes were going unfocused. His heart was racing, Anakin could feel his pulse. “Not safe,” he rasped, reaching a hand out, grabbing at Anakin’s arm. 

“You’re safe enough,” Anakin told him, the words a promise he hadn’t meant to offer. “I’m Anakin. Anakin Skywalker, and I’m looking after you and your kid, now, come  _ on _ . Who are  _ you _ ?”

The man’s eyes fluttered. He was sinking down against the mattress, losing whatever battle he was fighting with unconsciousness. Anakin shook him, just a little, because it had been  _ days _ , and he wanted to know who he had taking up the only bed in his rooms and draining his accounts. “Hey, tell me your name.”

The pilot focused on him, for an instant, and it hit Anakin in the gut the same way it had the first time. “My name?” he asked, brows drawing together, as though the question were too much for him to handle. “I’m - I’m Obi-Wan. Yes,” he said, and was unconscious again, a moment later, sinking back down into dreams. Anakin scowled, sitting there with a hand on his chest.

“Well, Obi-Wan,” he said, straightening blankets over him. “You’re trouble, I know that.”

#

Obi-Wan woke off and on, over the next several days. Anakin slept when he could, usually wedged into a corner. The baby mostly slept, too, but Anakin thought that was just a baby thing, not an indication the boy was ill. He hadn’t spent much time with children.

He was sleeping, the kid in a little basket he’d picked up from the market, when he heard movement. He woke quickly, always had. You didn’t want to wake up slow, in the places he’d grown up. Bad things happened to heavy sleepers.

Anakin slid to his feet without thought, automatically checking the blaster at his waist, even as he realized the sounds were coming from down the hall. He turned the corner in time to watch Obi-Wan reach the doorframe, reaching a hand out to brace on the wall, the other arm curled around his chest.

He was wearing only the thin breeches Anakin had pulled onto him, his skin covered otherwise only with bandages. Anakin scowled at him, and said, “You shouldn’t be up.”

Obi-Wan lifted his head, expression wan and drawn. He said, shaking his head, “I’m thirsty.”

Anakin eyed him. In truth, it was shocking to see him up and about at all. He’d been bad off when Anakin found him. But he’d always heard the Jedi could heal fast. Maybe that was true, maybe this Obi-Wan was just too stubborn to rest. In either case, Anakin sighed. “Fine. Go back and lie down, I’ll bring you something.”

He turned, moving towards his little cooling unit. It shouldn’t have functioned, by rights, but Anakin was good at fixing things. He was the only one with cool food and drinks in the entire neighborhood, as far as he knew. He grabbed some water for Obi-Wan, some liquor for himself, and turned back to find Obi-Wan leaned against the wall, a few feet away.

He was quiet for a man who looked dead on his feet. Anakin arched an eyebrow and offered out the water. Obi-Wan took it, swallowing and looking around, gaze roving until he found the kid. He limped over while Anakin watched, leaning against a stack of parts and taking a long drink that burned all the way down his throat.

“He’s alright. Thank you,” Obi-Wan said, when he reached the kid and half-fell, half-knelt beside the bassinet. He reached out with a clearly shaking hand, touching the kid’s hair and face. “Force, you saved our lives.”

Anakin swallowed and looked to the side. “Yeah, well.” He took another drink. He didn’t say anyone would have done it. Most people would have been smarter and would have left the two of them to die, or at least only taken the kid. A little thing like him probably would have brought decent money on the open market.

Anakin scowled, jaw grinding together, and asked, “What’s his name?”

“Better you don’t know,” Obi-Wan said, something mournful in his tone. Anakin looked back at him, found him staring at nothing, eyes haunted. “I’ve already endangered you by staying here… how long?” He glanced over.

Anakin shrugged. “Six days.”

“Sithspit,” Obi-Wan hissed, trying to push to his feet all at once, looking down at himself. “Where are my clothes?”

“In a trash heap somewhere,” Anakin said, raising an eyebrow when Obi-Wan frowned at him. “They were scrapped. And even if they weren’t…” He shifted, uncomfortable under those clear blue eyes. “You don’t really want to go around wearing… something like that.”

Obi-Wan went still, some new wariness coming over his expression. “Like what?” he asked, bracing, suddenly.

Anakin gestured to the side with his bottle. “Like a Jedi. There’s a bounty on their heads right now, you know.”

Obi-Wan was watching him, expression cautious. “Is that right?”

“Mm.” Anakin nodded. “They say one of them attempted to kill the Chancellor. And that the entire lot was behind the war. That they were trying to seize power in the Senate.” Obi-Wan flinched, looking to the side, grief twisting his expression fast and sudden. Anakin watched him, still not sure exactly what he was dealing with, and added, “That they steal children.”

He watched Obi-Wan’s cheek twitch, but he didn’t make any sweeping denials. He just said, “Do they?”

“They do.” Anakin sighed, finishing the bottle and tossing it aside. “But I know that part’s a lie.” In his experience, the Jedi wouldn’t take children even if they were begging to go. “And the rest smells like bantha kark to me, too. So.” He pushed away from the wall, walked over, smothering a wince when Obi-Wan jerked to his feet. Anakin pulled the weapon he’d taken from Obi-Wan off of his belt and held it out. “You might want to keep that out of view.”

Obi-Wan didn’t even glance at it, holding Anakin’s gaze, something challenging there, as though Anakin didn’t have inches on him and a solid two stone, as though he weren’t up and about because of Anakin’s blood in his veins. 

Anakin maybe liked that, the way Obi-Wan met his gaze head on - more than he should. Obi-Wan said, “It’s a diagnostic tool.”

Anakin snorted, “Sure.”

“Believe what you like,” Obi-Wan said, tilting his chin up to keep Anakin’s gaze when he stepped closer. “I need to get out of here. I don’t suppose you happen to know… where I am? Or how I might get transport?”

Anakin sighed. Obi-Wan had been nothing but a drain on his resources since they met. He was losing money right now. He needed to focus on  _ that _ , not the way Obi-Wan stared at him like he was neither impressed nor afraid. He said, some dark wash of self-loathing moving through him as he leaned a little closer, “I’m sure I could come up with some suggestions. But I’m already pretty in the red for you and the kid. You got anything to pay with?”

Obi-Wan looked at him, and Anakin thought he’d get punched, for a moment. But then Obi-Wan looked down and to the side, towards the kid, and his posture shifted. He said, glancing up with a smile that reached down into Anakin’s skin and increased his temperature, all at once, “I’m sure we can come to an agreement. Anything you had in mind?”

Anakin froze, a dozen memories of his mother from his childhood sleeting through his head, all at once. He shook himself, stepping back, away from the promise of warmth and soft skin. He’d never been any good at doing what he should do, what needed done. There was a reason he was still stuck on Tatooine at his age. He should have been gone years ago. He just never had the stomach for what leaving would take.

He still didn’t, evidently.

He said, keeping his gaze on the far wall, “Nevermind. Let’s just get you out of here, before you cause me any more trouble.”

#

Obi-Wan should have looked hilarious in Anakin’s clothes. He swam in them. One shoulder of the smallest shirt Anakin had kept slipping to the side, revealing a collarbone that Anakin had been staring at for six days. He should have no longer found it so intriguing, but every time he looked over and saw it, it caught his attention, reminding him of the little scar he couldn’t see anymore, and the freckles he knew were under the fabric.

He couldn’t find anything funny about Obi-Wan wearing his clothes, in the end. It left him with a hot ache in his gut, instead, one he tried to set aside, especially after their interaction that morning. The shame of knowing he’d made a heavy-handed, crude pass to a man who was so desperate he’d  _ taken it _ after looking at his kid--

Well. 

Anakin swallowed the guilt down, resolutely kept his eyes off of Obi-Wan’s collarbone, and packed him a bag. Obi-Wan was trouble he didn’t need, in more ways than one. Best to get him and the kid the hell away, so Anakin could get back to trying to claw his way off of this rock.

Obi-Wan checked the kid over while Anakin shoved supplies into a pack. The kid gurgled and blew bubbles. A newborn, the doc had said. Couldn’t have been more than a few days old, when they first crashed. Amazing it had lived, she’d said. Anakin watched out of the corner of his eyes as Obi-Wan cradled the kid close, hand spread across the baby’s back.

They looked out of place amongst all the junk in his rooms. He looked away. They needed to go. Move on. He walked over, slinging the bag over his shoulder and grabbing a cloak. “I’ll take you as far as the port,” he said. “Help you find a ship, alright?” He held the cloak out to Obi-Wan, who took it with a curious look.

Their fingers brushed, and Anakin swallowed, feeling a little thrum across his nerves. “Thank you,” Obi-Wan said, pulling the cloak on.  _ It  _ swallowed him, too, obviously too big in a way that made Anakin’s gut ache. “You’ve been very kind.”

“Don’t mention it,” Anakin said, because this kindness was costing him, more than he could justify, really. The continued reminders that he was being an idiot ground like rocks in his guy. “Let’s just get you out of here.” And maybe they would have gone to the port. And maybe he’d have put Obi-Wan and the kid on a ship. And maybe he’d have never seen either of them again, except that Obi-Wan jerked his head to the side at that moment, going suddenly tense.

“What?” Anakin asked.

Obi-Wan looked back at him, expression gone grim. “Is there another way out of here?”

“Yeah.” Anakin wrinkled his nose. “Of course, I’m not an--”

“Where is it?”

“Why?” Anakin frowned over at the video feeds he’s set up to show the halls in the ramshackle building and cursed at the first flashes of movement. He’d only seen the clone troopers on vids, before. Their armor and blasters looked a lot more intimidating on the vid feed in  _ his building _ . “They’re here for you?”

Obi-Wan stared at him for a moment, and then jerked out a nod. He gestured down at the child. “And for him.”

“Kriffing of course.” Anakin turned, putting a hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder and nudging him along. “Alright, this way.” He had to push aside a pile of parts to get to the hatch. He pulled the cover off of the command pad as someone  _ shot  _ at his front door. 

He jerked the hatch open, hearing the door kick open, and turned in time for Obi-Wan to push the baby at him. Obi-Wan looked tired, hurt, out-of-sorts in a shirt slipping off of his shoulder. He said, reaching for the weapon on his belt, “Take him somewhere safe. I’ll buy you time.”

Anakin rolled his eyes and grabbed Obi-Wan’s arm. “We’re not doing that,” Anakin said, because he hadn’t dragged Obi-Wan out of the desert, lost out on a huge score, and blown a tremendous part of his savings patching the guy up to let him die nobly to some more blaster bolts.

“What--”

Anakin dragged him forward, into the small dark space between two sets of apartments. He was still holding the kid, and the baby was squirming in his arms, but at least he stayed quiet. Anakin nudged Obi-Wan forward, and said, “Sh,” hitting the control pad on the other side of the door.

It was utterly dark, in the little space, but Anakin had made a point of learning the space with his eyes closed, just in case. He moved forward, leading Obi-Wan along, wincing when the sound of crashing and blaster shots started coming up from his apartment. They’d almost made it to the end by the time one of the more enterprising troopers blasted a hole in the wall and flooded light down the passage.

Anakin snapped, “Run,” and jerked Obi-Wan forward. Running couldn’t be good for him in his condition, but he didn’t complain, matching Anakin’s speed even with Anakin’s longer legs. Anakin led him out into the burning daylight, dodging into alleys and listening to the sounds of the troopers fading into the distance.

No one knew the city as well as he did. He got them thoroughly lost, pulling Obi-Wan into an old storage building, and only then slowing down. Obi-Wan swayed as soon as they slowed, weight going onto Anakin as he gasped at the air. Anakin looked down at him and found him holding his side, his fingers stained with bright, red blood.

Anakin swallowed the shout in his throat. They didn’t need anyone knowing where they were. He shifted, pushing Obi-Wan against the closest wall and shoving the kid at him. Obi-Wan took the baby without complaint, leaning his head back as Anakin pulled aside his cloak and lifted the too-big shirt.

“It tore open,” Anakin said, scowling. The wound low on his gut had been the ugliest. It had soaked clean through the bandage. Blood was running down his stomach.

“I hadn’t noticed,” Obi-Wan said, gritting the words out, and Anakin snorted. “Hold him a moment. I’ll take care of it.” Anakin was getting a bit tired of having a baby thrust upon him, much less a baby whose name he didn’t even know, but he took the kid. Obi-Wan swallowed, drew his weapon, and said, “There’s nothing in the wound?”

“Not as far as I -- kriffing hell!”

Anakin hadn’t expected him to just  _ press the blade  _ of his glowing sword against the wound, but that was what he’d done, his jaw clenched shut. His mouth twitched, just a little, at the smell of burning flesh and that was it. He didn’t make a sound, didn’t whimper, didn’t scream, just cauterized the wound and then turned off the weapon.

Anakin gaped at him, before managing, “A diagnostic tool, huh?”

Obi-Wan gasped a laugh, opening his eyes with a ragged little smile. “They’ll be looking for me,” he said. “You should get away from us, while you can.”

Anakin rolled his eyes. “Well, that’s not happening,” he said. “I can get us out of town. Someplace safe. Unless you’d rather stay here and die?”

Obi-Wan shook his head. “By all means,” he said, gesturing vaguely. “Take us to safety.”

Anakin eyed him. “You can walk?”

Obi-Wan cut him a look, surprised, perhaps, though Anakin didn’t understand  _ why _ . He’d done nothing but help the pair out since he found them in the desert. “I’ve had much worse,” Obi-Wan said, straightening his cloak and shirt and pushing away from the wall. And Anakin didn’t doubt it. He’d seen the scars all over Obi-Wan’s body.

He nodded, adjusting his hold on the baby; it didn’t look like Obi-Wan really needed the extra burden, and reached out to tug him along. “This way. And stay quiet.”

#

Anakin liberated a speeder from a scrap yard across town. It wasn’t a choice he’d have taken if he planned to stick around, but he doubted the crew running the yard would be willing to pursue him where he was headed. Most folk thought the Sand People were too much trouble to risk that particular trip.

He figured the Sand People had more to worry about from  _ him _ , after what they’d tried with his mother, urging Obi-Wan up into the speeder and depositing the kid in his lap. 

They fled town at a sedate pace, trying not to draw attention. Better not to paint a target on their backs by speeding out of town. No doubt a few people would note their departure, all the regular vultures, but Anakin had two blasters and a few other surprises hidden about his person.

He’d be ready for a few visitors to drop in.

He waited until they were well outside of town to glance over at Obi-Wan. He was holding the child, head leaned back against the seat, lines of tension around his eyes that said he was awake. His color was bad. 

Anakin frowned, looking away from him, scanning the road and the surrounding hills for the inevitable attempt at ambush, and said, “Alright, this trip is going to take a few days in this thing, so. Come on. What’s your kid’s name, I can’t keep calling him ‘the baby.’ Don’t give me that ‘it’s safer I don’t know, kark,’ I’m helping you run away from the army. Nothing you don’t tell me is going to make me safer.”

Obi-Wan made a small sound, maybe a laugh, stirring a bit in the seat. “Fair enough,” he said. “He’s called Luke.”

“Luke.” Anakin looked over at the kid - sleeping again - and considered the softness of his cheeks and downy hair. He wondered how long it would take Tatooine to turn him into something hard. He shook the thought away, other questions battering at his thoughts, anyway. His attention shifted back to Obi-Wan, who should have been anything  _ but  _ soft, and yet… Anakin cleared his throat. “And his mother? Where’s she?”

Obi-Wan opened his eyes, then, but Anakin got the feeling he wasn’t looking at anything around them. There was a distant quality to his gaze. “Far from here,” he said. “I don’t know exactly where. She didn’t tell me where she was going.”

Anakin nodded. That happened, sometimes. “I’m sorry,” he said, a whispering voice in the back of his mind suggesting that her - whoever she turned out to be - loss might be his gain. Which was beyond foolish. He didn’t need to be looking out for some Jedi being hunted by the law, especially if he were running around with a kid.

Those were all anchors Anakin didn’t need. He cleared his throat. “You - I thought the Jedi didn’t…” he gestured, a bit crudely, and Obi-Wan laughed again, louder this time, the sound turning into a cough.

“We don’t,” he said, repeating the gesture with a bit more flair, which made Anakin’s ears heat. “Luke isn’t… He’s not mine. By blood.”

Anakin cut him a sideways look. “And this is where you explain what you’re doing with a baby that isn’t yours,” he prompted.

For a moment, he thought Obi-Wan wouldn’t, would just go tight-lipped on him, instead. But Obi-Wan lifted his gaze to the sky and spoke, finally. “His mother, we’ve been friends for a very long time. She - she contacted me, some months ago. Concerned because she had become… pregnant. There was no father. I know how it sounds, but I have no reason to believe she’d lie to me.”

“Sure,” Anakin said, keeping his own jolting sense of unease to himself. His mother had always said he had no father, too. He’d figured, years ago, that it was just her way of distancing herself from whatever act had led to his conception. He didn’t blame her for it. As far as he was concerned, he had no father, either.

But. 

He cleared his throat and prompted, “And?”

“And the - the pregnancy drew the attention of others. Our investigations led us to….” He shuddered. “To terrible revelations. She was taken, near the end, by - you are familiar with the Sith?”

Anakin shrugged. “I’ve heard stories. They’re evil Jedi, or something.”

Obi-Wan snorted. “Or something,” he said, dry, but offered no further explanation. “One took her. We believe he was… responsible for her condition. I went after her. I managed to find her in time. She gave birth to Luke and - and his twin sister.” He trailed off, expression etching deeper with grief with each word.

“Alright,” Anakin said, shifting around. He could pick up on emotions, sometimes. He was picking up on whatever was coming off of Obi-Wan, a sort of tremendous sense of sadness and failure. “And then you split up because…?”

“No.” Obi-Wan shook his head. “Then we found out what had happened. While I was rescuing her. The - the Sith lord had--” He gasped, a tight, hurt sound, and Anakin reaching out, gripping his shoulder.

“Hey, you know, why don’t you tell me later,” he said; it wasn’t like the story related to their present difficulties so much, anyway. “You don’t look so good, anyway.”

Obi-Wan looked at him sideways, mouth quirking. “I’m bleeding on the inside. Quite a lot,” he said, plain and without complaint, as though it were just an observation on the weather.

“Sithspit.” Anakin looked around, sincerely doubtful there were any medical supplies in this little speeder. They were days out from home. “Why didn’t you say anything? Can you…” He waved a hand. “Fix it? Can’t the Jedi heal themselves?”

“I can fall into a healing trance,” he said. “But.” He shifted his grip on Luke, an eyebrow arching like an explanation.

“I can watch the kid,” Anakin said, reaching for Luke. “Do whatever you need to do not to die.”

Obi-Wan stared at him, some consideration moving through his eyes. “It’s a lot to ask of--”

“I’m offering,” Anakin interrupted. “Relax. I’ve made this drive dozens of times. I can do it with my eyes closed. Give me the kid.”

Luke stirred a little when Obi-Wan handed him over, but quieted quickly. It wasn’t the safest way to transport an infant, probably, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. Anakin shifted his grip as Obi-Wan curled sideways, closing his eyes, going quiet.

“Just you and me now, Luke,” Anakin said, glancing down at the baby, before looking around the hills. “And whoever’s out there.”

#

Their friends didn’t decide to pop in to say hello until Anakin had to stop and stretch his legs. He picked the spot carefully, waiting until the hills got closer and harsher, an area where attackers couldn’t come at him all at once.

There was a little imperfection in one of the stone walls rising up, not large enough to be called a cave, and he left the speeder there, shielded on a few sides, when he climbed out and stretched. 

The other engines that had been following them cut off perhaps a half-second after he stopped. He smiled, cracked his neck from side to side, and pretended to be clueless. He felt calm inside, the way he did before a fight sometimes. Calm enough that he swore he could hear heartbeats approaching, that he could guess how many were coming.

He wouldn’t have to put them all down. Scavengers gave up once the job was no longer worth their while. Anakin pressed his back against the stone, still radiating heat from the day, took a breath, and raised his arm without needing to look at a target as the first heartbeat rounded the corner.

Anakin never missed with a blaster. Ever. His reputation had gotten around, but not, unfortunately, to the alien who entered the labyrinth of rocks first. They went down quiet, the reverberation of the blaster shot echoing in the night air, and then it was just screaming madness.

Anakin walked out the other side of it with a blasterburn across his shoulder, not bad, all things considered. One of the scavengers had reached the speeder before Anakin dropped them. Anakin pushed the body off with his hip, climbing back inside. 

Luke was wailing, the first time he’d heard the kid just bawl, and Anakin lifted him. “Hey, it’s okay,” Anakin said, bouncing him a little. “It was just some scary noises. Nothing will hurt you.” He heard his mother’s words coming out of his mouth and shivered, a little. She hadn’t been right, in the end. But he knew she’d tried her best to make the words true. “Nothing will hurt you, I’m right here.”

#

Anakin dared to stop again only when the suns started beating down, cruel and overhot against the speeder. It was an old thing, not in the best shape, and already threatening to overheat. He knew of a little cave system, just big enough to fit inside, and took them there, hoping it would be empty.

By a stroke of luck, it was, though there were a few suspicious cases in the back. Anakin left them alone. He had enough trouble without borrowing more.

It was cooler in the caves, but not by much. Obi-Wan was still unconscious - in a trance, whatever - and Anakin looked at him before shrugging and lifting him into the back. He looked more comfortable, spread out. Anakin tucked Luke down beside him, and went to crouch by the entrance to the cave, blasters in hand, waiting.

#

It wasn’t scavengers that came for them, next. It was troopers, all dressed in white, searching in a grid pattern. Anakin swore under his breath, watching them get closer and closer. There were too many of them to fight and, anyway, he had a feeling they  _ wouldn’t  _ run off just because he took out a few of them. 

He sprinted back for the speeder; the suns were starting to set, anyway. He’d just have to hope she could make it.

He clipped a trooper on the way out of the little cave, and didn’t look back. Blaster shots winged out all around them; Anakin fired a few back, flooring the accelerator and hoping none of them were good drivers or good shots. 

He really thought they were going to make it, before the engine hiccuped, stalled, and left them drifting to a stop. “Kriff me,” he snarled, watching smoke billow up from the engines. He’d gotten them  _ some  _ distance. That was a cold comfort when he leapt out, jerking the hood up, ignoring the heat of the metal against his skin.

Anakin knew engines, better than anything else. He bent over, waving smoke away, looking at the damage. Repairable. With time. He felt heartbeats approaching, moving in, each one slow and steady.

He took out the first trooper that came into view, half his attention still on the speeder, and if he hadn’t been all-in on whatever was coming for Obi-Wan, he was then. He’d killed a trooper, a soldier in the army. There’d be no walking  _ that  _ back, and he knew it.

He shifted his aim, anger and fear mingling in his chest as more and more of them came,  _ running _ .

“What’s going on?” Obi-Wan demanded, sitting up in the speeder and cursing, abruptly.

“We’ve got company,” Anakin said, winging off another shot. “Friends of yours, I guess. And the kriffing speeder blew a coolant hose, it’s--”

“Can you fix it?” Obi-Wan asked, leaping out of the speeder, yanking Anakin’s cloak off and leaving it in the sand. He seemed prepared to ignore the dried blood on the shirt, drawing his saber and spinning it, walking a few paces forward.

“I can fix anything,” Anakin said, “are you--”

“Fix it, then,” Obi-Wan said, and Anakin  _ meant to _ , except then Obi-Wan was  _ moving  _ and it was like watching poetry. Anakin stared, knowing he shouldn’t, as Obi-Wan batted away blaster bolts, almost blurring he moved so fast.

Anakin shook himself, bending over the engine, the heat of the components burning his fingers, but they’d been burned before, so often he barely felt it. The back of his neck itched. There were blaster bolts  _ everywhere _ . By rights, he should have been worried about one hitting him. But he wasn’t.

“Alright!” he called, rerouting the coolant with an ugly little patch that wouldn’t hold for more than a day or two and slamming the hood shut. “She’ll go, get back here.” He scrambled over the hood, dropping into the driver’s seat and spooling up the engine.

He half-expected Obi-Wan to argue about staying behind again, but he just jumped up onto the rear of the speeder, instead, still deflecting blaster bolts. There were an impressive number of white-armored bodies on the ground. Anakin looked up at him, felt a kick in his gut, and said, “You should sit down.”

“I’ll be fine,” Obi-Wan said. “Go.”

Anakin shrugged and went. He figured Obi-Wan would realize his mistake right away, but he just  _ stayed there _ , like he’d tethered himself onto the speeder somehow, saber a blurring, humming shield until they outpaced the last of the blaster bolts. 

It was only then that he sagged, taking a step backwards and tripping into the backseat, falling. Anakin reached back, grabbing him as he collapsed, and demanded, “Hey, hey, are you okay?”

Obi-Wan shook his head, covered in sweat, skin far too hot, and said, “No, not really,” before he slipped back into unconsciousness.

#

Anakin had  _ planned  _ to take a straight shot to his mother’s house, to home. But they were obviously being followed, and by more than scavengers. He adjusted his course, heading deeper into the hills that no one from offworld had ever bothered to map, the smugglers tunnels, the slave pits. 

Half the roads on Tatooine were underground, tunnels that shifted and changed based on the needs of whoever happened to be using them at the time. Anakin took them in deep, avoiding the well-traveled paths, disappearing them.

It was cooler underground, downright cold by the time he stopped. He tended to Luke; it was vitally important the baby stayed as quiet as possible down in the caves; there were all kinds of things living in them. And then he checked on Obi-Wan, who was burning up, curled on his side, and shivering.

Anakin grumbled a curse, pulling at his shirt, checking on the wounds beneath. None of the rest had reopened, but Obi-Wan’s gut was turning purple and black. It felt hard under his touch, when he pressed. “Do not die,” Anakin snapped at him, “I mean it. You better be in your healing trance, you hear me?”

He received no answer, and shifted around, unsure what to do, how to help. He needed to sleep. It had been far too long since he shut his eyes. He stretched out in the back, pulling Obi-Wan close, hoping body heat might chase the shivers out of his skin, and arranging Luke.

He’d just have to hope no one found them.

#

“Mm.” Anakin woke up because someone was squirming against him, and it had been, frankly, too long since that happened. He tightened his grip, feeling muscles move against his chest and under his hands, and nuzzled forward, bleary and not nearly all the way awake.

The person he was holding went still again, when Anakin brushed lips over soft skin, and it was only then that Obi-Wan said, “Good morning to you, as well. Where are we?”

Anakin blinked, awake all the way and all at once. “In the back of the speeder,” he said, feigning grogginess though he felt electrically aware. They were all in a tangle. He had a hand under Obi-Wan’s shirt, fingers flattened low on his stomach. He was, currently, breathing against Obi-Wan’s throat.

“Ah,” Obi-Wan said. One of Luke’s tiny hands was pressed against Anakin’s nose. “Why?”

“Because I needed to sleep and you were in a coma.” Anakin felt strongly that they should probably move. Obi-Wan  _ had  _ to be able to feel the state he’d awoken in. It was unavoidable, given their current close contact. 

“I was  _ not  _ in a coma,” Obi-Wan said, and Anakin would have argued that it made no difference if he wanted to call it a healing trance, but Luke started complaining then, and Obi-Wan shifted away from him. Anakin decided to climb out of the speeder, checking the engine over, and taking deep breaths until his problem eased.

It threatened to return when Obi-Wan walked over to join him, shirt fully off of his shoulder, baby cradled in his arms. Anakin glanced at him, flushed, and asked, “You okay?”

“I’m feeling much better,” Obi-Wan said, though Anakin wasn’t entirely sure he could be trusted. The maniac took on an entire battalion of troopers while bleeding internally. He obviously couldn’t be trusted to make an accurate assessment of his well-being, though it had been the most impressive thing Anakin could remember seeing. “Thank you.”

“We should get going,” Anakin said, closing the hood, grateful that it appeared they weren’t going to discuss his loss of control.

#

“Alright,” Anakin said, half a day later; they were making decent time, and, with any luck, had thoroughly lost everyone after them. “So, tell me about what this Sith lord did while you were rescuing Luke’s mother.”

Obi-Wan flinched. Anakin watched it out of the corner of his eye, and felt shitty about it, but he needed to know exactly what he’d jumped into, so he didn’t take the question back. Obi-Wan touched Luke’s head - the kid was asleep again - and said, “He… Members of my Order served as Generals, during the war.”

“I heard,” Anakin said. He’d seen the holos, all about the Jedi and how they’d lead this campaign or that campaign. How they lost battles. How they left people behind to die. Most of the news had been dire, for so long.

Obi-Wan nodded. “We - we worked with the clones.”

“Your buddies back there,” Anakin said. 

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said, sounding sad and distant. “Though those weren’t… my men. They turned on us. After I rescued my friend.  _ While  _ I was rescuing my friend. They - they killed my brothers and sisters. Without warning. In the field. At our Temple. It was - the children--”

“Hey.” Anakin had never known how to comfort anyone. It wasn’t a skill he’d had to display much in his life. He reached out, gripping Obi-Wan’s shoulder, fingers brushing skin. “It’s alright.”

“It’s not,” Obi-Wan said, barking a bitter laugh. “I went to the Temple. Afterwards. I didn’t believe…” He trailed off, eyes shining and wet. “I saw the bodies. They just left them. Wherever they fell. They killed everyone. Down to the smallest child.”

Anakin swallowed, looking away, dark memories creeping into his mind. When the Sand People had taken his mother, he’d been furious, beyond incandescent rage when they found her to bring her home. If there hadn’t been others with him - Cliegg and Owen - he wasn’t sure what  _ he  _ would have done to everyone in that camp.

“How’d you get away?” he asked, trying to shove aside the memories.

Obi-Wan shook his head. “Luck? My troopers, they - they tried to kill me. But I got away. I saw the Temple, I went after my friend….” He trailed off, eyes shutting as he curled over, as though nursing some great pain. “We don’t know why the Sith lord wanted the twins,” he said, slowly. “But we couldn’t let him have them. So we… we each took one, and we went as far apart as we could. Troopers tracked me, somehow. Shot me down over this planet. Now I’m here.” He laughed, a little, raggedly. “Endangering you.”

“You  _ are  _ a lot of trouble,” Anakin told him.

“Fortunate that someone so kind-hearted found me,” he said, and Anakin snorted. He wasn’t kind-hearted, and he knew that. But maybe he kind of liked that Obi-Wan thought he was. Maybe he didn’t want to disabuse Obi-Wan of that notion, just yet.

He said, shaking the thoughts aside, “We’re going to be going topside again, soon. Hopefully there won’t be any surprises waiting for us, but just in case…”

“I’ll be prepared,” Obi-Wan said.

#

“I met a Jedi once before,” Anakin said, when they next had to stop, in the middle of the hottest part of the day when their speeder’s engine started to whine and wouldn’t stop. They were huddled in the shadow of a cliff-face, the heat pressed close and oppressive all around them.

Obi-Wan glanced over at him, eyebrow raised. He was starting to burn impressively. His fair skin wasn’t suited at all to Tatooine’s suns. “You did?”

Anakin nodded, wishing he’d never mentioned it, but Obi-Wan brought all of the memories back. He shifted his heel through the sand. “Yeah. Years and years ago. I was just a kid. He showed up, big, tall guy, looking around for credits to fix his ship.”

Obi-Wan straightened, tilting his head to the side. “A tall man, with long hair?”

Anakin met his gaze, frowning, “Yeah. He had this weird guy with him, some race I’d never seen. Master Qui-Gon Jinn.” He’d never forgotten the Jedi’s name. At first he’d held onto it like a beacon of hope and, then, when he realized everything had been a lie and that no one was coming back for him, as a reminder that he shouldn’t trust anyone. “You knew him?”

Obi-Wan looked stricken, some deep hurt passing across his expression. His mouth quirked, though there was no amusement in the expression. “Yes. I knew him. He trained me.”

“Oh, yeah?” Anakin looked away, grinding his teeth together. “Well, he  _ said  _ he was going to--”

“He died,” Obi-Wan cut in, softly. “On a planet named Naboo. Shortly after he was diverted to  _ this _ planet. We had been on a mission, we’d split up, trying to protect the Queen of Naboo. He’d taken her on his ship, and sent me off with a handmaiden, who. Well. It’s not important.”

Something cold reached into Anakin’s chest. He turned to look at Obi-Wan, a scab tearing off of an old wound. “What?”

Obi-Wan’s smile twisted; he gestured out to the side. “We were working to protect Naboo. A Sith showed up, he’d been following my Master since Tatooine. We fought him and… Master Qui-Gon fell.”

It felt like the world was reshaping itself under his feet. All the things that he knew to be true were turning, suddenly, on their heads. He said, almost dizzy with the news, “What happened to the Sith?”

Obi-Wan looked to the side, hands clenching. He said, “I killed him. Or thought I did.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I can tell that you are Force sensitive.” He looked back, and there was something sad in his eyes. “I - if he had lived, I’m sure he would have come back. If I had known…” He trailed off, shoulders slumping downwards, like one more weight had been added to everything else he was trying to carry.

“But you didn’t,” Anakin said, shaking his head. He didn’t know how to  _ feel _ , but his chest seemed lighter. He’d thought Qui-Gon had just… just spoken soothing platitudes, to get Anakin’s help, and then left. He’d thought he’d been used and cast aside. He’d thought…

Well, he’d been wrong. “Hey,” he said, and after so many days in close quarters, it felt natural to put hands on Obi-Wan’s arms, to squeeze a little. “You didn’t know. And, anyway, if he’d come back for me, it sounds like I’d be dead right now.”

Obi-Wan shook his head, once, looking to the side. “Still. You must have been a child, I can only imagine--”

“Well, I’m not a child now,” Anakin interrupted, because it was difficult to hold onto anger at a man who had, apparently, died trying to save a whole planet, and impossible to be angry at Obi-Wan, who had never known Anakin existed. And he didn’t particularly want Obi-Wan thinking of him as a sad nine-year-old.

Obi-Wan glanced up at him, down, and up again, eyebrow rising, mouth quirking when he said, “No, you’re most certainly not.”

Anakin had always heard the Jedi didn’t take lovers. Obi-Wan had said they didn’t. But Obi-Wan was, presently, looking up at him, sucking in a little breath when Anakin lifted a hand to brush his jaw. Tension hummed between them, and so it was, of course, then when Luke began fussing.

#

“We should get there within the day,” Anakin said, after pulling the speeder into another shaded spot the following day. It was one of the hottest days he could remember, so hot the air was vibrating with it. Nothing was moving, even the wind. He grimaced, shrugging out of his shirt and tossing it into the speeder.

When he glanced over his shoulder, Obi-Wan was looking at him, not quite with the heat in his gaze that Anakin had possibly been hoping for. Instead, there was a little frown on his mouth, and he said, “You were hit by a blaster.”

Anakin glanced down at his arm and shrugged. “It was only a graze,” he said. “I’ve had worse, too.”

Obi-Wan’s gaze wandered. He said, shoving his hair back from his face, “I can see that. What happened?”

Anakin sighed. The scars either went over very well - so many people found them intriguing - or very poorly. He wasn’t sure how Obi-Wan was taking them, yet. “My mother and I were slaves, most of my childhood. So... “ He gestured at his back, the white marks that criss-crossed his shoulders, and watched Obi-Wan’s mouth press thinner. “And then I didn’t pick the  _ safest  _ job choices, once I was old enough. It’s rough out here.”

“So I see,” Obi-Wan said, as though he weren’t walking around looking like someone had patched him together using little more than spit and prayer once or twice. 

“I always wondered why the Jedi let it happen,” Anakin said, because thoughts of his childhood always took him down dark paths. “The slave trade. You - they could have stopped it, if they wanted.”

Obi-Wan looked to the side, voice gone tense when he said, “We serve - served - at the will of the Senate. We couldn’t just--”

“Why not?” Anakin cut in, pacing across the sand. There was always some  _ reason  _ people couldn’t just kriffing step in and make things stop. And it was always ridiculous and self-serving and--

“Because the Jedi decided to just do what they wanted, before. Long ago. And it was…” He trailed off, swallowing. “Almost the end of the galaxy. And so we swore not to. We submitted ourselves to the guidance of the Senate, to obeying their orders. To the will of the people.”

“And the people didn’t care,” Anakin said, sharp, shaking his head. “I’m not surprised. Why should they care, in their fine homes, safe and secure. People like that never care. Not about people like me.” He glanced over, heart twisting in his chest, remembering all the old wounds on Obi-Wan’s skin. It wasn’t like Obi-Wan had been sitting around doing nothing while Anakin and his mother suffered. “Or people like you.”

Obi-Wan was silent. He looked to the side and said nothing, his eyes shut, as the world sweltered around them. He said, “Let me see to your arm.” And Anakin stood still as he came closer. His fingers were cool and sure on Anakin’s skin. He worked like he knew exactly how to field-dress a wound, like he didn’t have to think about it.

#

They finally made it to the Lars homestead after a long push through the night. The first of the suns was beginning to rise as Anakin brought the speeder in. Owen ran out, rifle in hand, as Anakin cut the engine, took one look at him, and burst into a grin.

“Anakin!” he said, shouldering the rifle and stepping forward to pull him into a one-armed hug. “This is unexpected. Shmi didn’t say you were coming.”

“She didn’t know,” Anakin said, slapping Owen on the shoulders and stepping back, turning to tilt his head towards the speeder. Obi-Wan had climbed out in the interim, holding Luke carefully to his chest. “Owen, this is…” Probably for the best if they didn’t know  _ exactly  _ who Obi-Wan was, “Ben. And his son, Luke. Ben, this is Owen. My step-brother.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Owen said, still beaming, moving to shake Obi-Wan’s hand. “Come inside, everyone should be getting up by now.” He turned, heading for the main building, and Anakin nodded after him. 

“Ben?” Obi-Wan asked, raising an eyebrow.

Anakin shrugged, leaning closer and keeping his voice low. “Would you rather I have introduced you as General Obi-Wan? Go on in,” he said, putting a hand briefly on Obi-Wan’s back. “I’ll get the speeder out of the way of prying eyes and be right there.”

Being on the Lars homestead always left Anakin feeling distinctly out of sorts. He’d been so angry when they first arrived, at the whole galaxy and at Cliegg, specifically, for buying them. It hadn’t mattered, really, that he’d freed them, too. Not at first.

Anakin had lit out as soon as he was able, first to Mos Eisley and then beyond, looking for work, whatever kind he could grab. He’d done a lot of jobs as a mechanic, and he’d done a lot of fighting, and he’d been building his savings, planning on scraping together enough to buy some old ship and really get off this rock…

And he’d found Obi-Wan, crashed and mostly dead, and all those plans had gone away.

He pushed the speeder into one of the barns, piled parts and equipment in front of it, covered the mess of it up, and dusted off his hands. He might have gone crazy, but it would be good to see his mother again. He looked down at his filthy clothes, shrugged, and shoved his hair back. She’d gotten used to him showing up filthy long ago.

The main house was buzzing with activity when he ducked through the door. It was already too crowded, just with Owen’s new wife around. He could only imagine what it would be like with him and Obi-Wan added to the mix, for however long they stayed. His mother was over at the table, holding Luke, brushing back his downy hair. Of Obi-Wan, Anakin saw no sign.

“Ani,” his mother said, without even glancing at him, but - like him - she’d always been able to tell some things. “This child is adorable.” She looked over at him then, a soft smile on her weathered face.

“I thought so,” Anakin said, moving to the sink to wash his hands and face. “Where’s Ben?”

“Owen took him to wash off properly. Poor thing looks like he needs some rest.” She narrowed her eyes, tilting her chin at the table. Anakin obediently sat, looking her over while she stared back, absently tending Luke. She said, after a moment, “You want to tell me why you brought them here, Ani? It’s been almost a year since we’ve seen you.”

Anakin shifted in the chair, looking to the side. It was hard to come back here, to this strange little life his mother had made, where she seemed, inexplicably, happy. Even after the Sand People had taken her a few years back, she hadn’t wanted to consider the idea of getting off-world. They’d fought about it, last time he visited. 

She’d wanted him to come back, to stop running around in the city. He didn’t have to be a farmer, she’d said, there were plenty around who’d pay for him to keep up their droids and equipment, but…

All Anakin had wanted to do, really, since he could remember, was get off kriffing Tatooine, off into the stars. He sighed, rubbing at his face, shaking aside all of those thoughts. “They needed to go somewhere quiet for awhile, that’s all.”

“They in some kind of trouble?” she asked.

Lying to her wouldn’t do any of them any good, and anyway, he’d never been able to manage it. She always knew when he tried. “Yeah, a bit.”

Her expression softened, her eyes going gentle as she shifted to grip his hand. “Always taking care of people,” she said, all affection and pride. He smiled back at her, reaching out to brush Luke’s hair, and she handed the baby over, standing, bending to press a kiss to the top of Anakin’s head. “I’ll get some food set out.”

#

Obi-Wan looked better, with the dust and sweat and blood all washed off. They’d also found him some clothes that fit better, and Anakin briefly mourned the glimpses of his collarbone. The soft fall of his hair - no longer covered in filth - and his trimmed beard weren’t quite a fair substitute.

He was polite and charming through the meal, allowing Anakin to field most of the questions. Still, his manners made Beru blush so red Anakin almost felt the heat coming off of her cheeks. She glanced at him over her shoulder when they finally left the structure, Anakin promising to show Obi-Wan around.

There wasn’t much to see. Moisture farming wasn’t a thrilling career, and it had to be less so to a Jedi, but Obi-Wan didn’t seem impatient. He smiled, when they got to Anakin’s little workshop, full of inventions and not-quite-finished projects. “You made all this?” he asked, turning in a little circle.

“I did,” Anakin scrubbed at the back of his neck. “They’re not much, I know, just...”

Obi-Wan glanced over his shoulder, frowning. “You’ve got talent,” he said. “Owen showed me a protocol droid you built from spare parts. It’s more functional than any of the ones I’ve seen come off assembly lines.”

Anakin looked to the side, feeling the burn of pleasure at the compliment light him up inside. “I only wanted to help my mother.”

“Mm. She’s very kind.” Obi-Wan shifted; he didn’t stay in any one position too long, sometimes moving with a grimace. The wound in his side, giving him trouble again, Anakin suspected. “All of your family is very kind. And they don’t deserve the trouble coming after me, Anakin. I’ll head off at nightfall, I can--”

Anakin reached out and grabbed him by the shoulders, frowning. “No, you won’t. Is there some  _ reason  _ you’re obsessed with the idea of going somewhere to die nobly, or--” Anakin stopped, jaw snapping shut, at Obi-Wan’s expression. It only lasted a moment, a glimpse of terrible pain, before it was closed off again. “Obi-Wan?”

Obi-Wan looked to the side. “The troopers aren’t going to just  _ stop  _ looking for me, but if they get me--”

“No one is going to  _ get you _ ,” Anakin said, sharper than he’d intended, but he’d dragged Obi-Wan out of the desert, blown his savings putting Obi-Wan back together, and hauled him halfway across Tatooine to safety. He felt like he had a stake here, in this, or he wanted to. “You don’t - I know you’re upset, about what happened. To the rest of your people.”

Obi-Wan flinched, turning in his hold. “Anakin--”

Anakin tightened his grip, interrupting, “But just because they died, it doesn’t mean you need to go die, too. Everyone prefers you alive to dead.”

Obi-Wan’s mouth twisted into a strange, tight smile. He said, “Oh, I’m sure that’s not--”

“I don’t mean those troopers, or the Sith, or whoever. I mean…” He waved a hand back towards the main house. “People who matter. Luke. And.” He took a breath, leaning a little closer, brushing his fingers over the back of Obi-Wan’s hand. “And me.”

Obi-Wan didn’t move for a breath, looking at their hands, before slowly glancing up. And Anakin wasn’t entirely sure where the two of them stood, how Obi-Wan felt about him, exactly, but, he’d never been anything if not bold.

His mother had always joked that he had no fear.

He leaned down, nose brushing against Obi-Wan’s, and light flooded in around them, along with Beru’s voice, proclaiming that it was time for them to come put in some work, if they wanted dinner that evening.

Anakin swore, listening to Obi-Wan say, “Of course, we’ll be happy to help. Perhaps you’d be so kind as to show me what to do?”

#

Space was tight on the farmstead. There’d never been enough of it, even when Anakin was just a kid. He caught his mother frowning at rooms, a pile of sheets in her arms, and nudged her. “They can stay in my room with me, it’s fine.”

She raised both her eyebrows at him. “There’s barely any room in there to begin with,” she said. “Or don’t you remember how you left it?”

“It’ll be fine,” Anakin said, though, like any space he inhabited for more than a few days, most surfaces were covered with parts and pieces. He took the sheets from her. “I’ll get it ready.”

He left Obi-Wan cleaning up supper, ducking into his bedroom with a little kick of memory that he set aside. He’d always pictured, growing up, that when he finally got a room of his own it would be huge, full of windows and cool breezes. He’d gotten this little space, full of sand and heat, and maybe he should have only been grateful, but at the time…

Well.

He shook his head, clearing aside projects abandoned long ago. There was a floor, somewhere below it all, and even a bed. He worked quickly and thoroughly. Luke wasn’t big enough to  _ go  _ anywhere, but Anakin had no real concept of when kids got the ability to be self-mobile. He didn’t want to risk it.

He was digging stuff out from under the bed when a shadow fell across his doorway. He looked up to find Owen looking around, and gave his step-brother a nod. “Your friends seem to be settling in alright,” Owen said, with a smile. He was holding a broom and started absently gathering up sand, not that it would do any good in the long run.

“Thanks for letting us stay.” Anakin had never been much good at smalltalk, and less so with Owen. In another life, maybe they would have been friends, but Anakin hadn’t wanted a friend or a brother when they met. He’d wanted the stars. 

Owen seemed not to hold a grudge. He never had, bobbing his head and saying, “We’d hardly turn you out, would we, especially with a baby along. And that poor man. Beru said it looked as though he’d been shot in the back.”

Anakin shoved down a reflexive surge of  _ something  _ at the thought of Beru seeing Obi-Wan’s healing wounds. He only nodded. “Yeah.” They worked in silence for a moment, but it was the kind of silence that left the hair on Anakin’s neck standing up. He glanced up, watching Owen intently sweeping a corner, and said, “What?”

“Nothing.” Owen flashed him a quick smile, ducking his head. “He’s just… a bit old for you, though, isn’t he?”

“No,” Anakin said, without any clear idea how old Obi-Wan actually  _ was _ . Old enough to have white hair at his temples and lines from smiling and frowning around his eyes. Old enough to carry more scars than any one person should. Old enough to stand on a racing speeder and bat away blaster bolts like it was  _ easy _ . It didn’t do a thing to change the thrum of want Anakin was carrying around inside his bones, so he figured that meant Obi-Wan was the perfect age.

“Alright, then,” Owen said, shrugging like he couldn’t quite see it, and helped with the rest of the room, making only idle conversation about the farm and his father’s health - still failing, as it had been since the attack of the Sand People.

#

Obi-Wan looked at the one bed in Anakin’s room and raised an eyebrow, when the day finally ended. Anakin shrugged back at him, shoulders tense at having Obi-Wan in this small, cramped space. He said, “I know it’s not much. Probably not what you’re used to.”

“Hm?” Obi-Wan looked exhausted, in a way he hadn’t a moment ago, out in the hall, as though he’d been wearing a mask and suddenly taken it off. Luke was already asleep in his arms. He blinked up at Anakin. “It’s bigger than my quarters were on the--” He cut off, with a little grimace. “I very much appreciate you sharing your room, Anakin. I can sleep on the floor, and--”

“Force,” Anakin grumbled, rolling his eyes and stepping up to Obi-Wan, a hand on his side to direct him towards the bed. “No one’s sleeping on the floor. We’ve been sleeping curled up together in a speeder for  _ days _ . Lie down.”

For a half-second, he thought Obi-Wan might protest, but he only said, “Well, if you insist,” and placed Luke in the little cradle that Cliegg had produced from a storage room. Anakin waited for him to climb onto the narrow mattress, dimmed the lights, and, after a moment’s thought, pulled off his shirt before making his own way to the bed. “It’ll get cold at night,” he warned, fitting his body against Obi-Wan’s. There was no room to spare on the bed; he had to pull his legs up just to keep his feet on the end.

“Mm?” Obi-Wan asked, and Anakin shifted up onto one elbow, wanting to look down at his face in the pale light. His eyes were already closed, and Anakin sighed. He brushed a kiss against Obi-Wan’s temple, and sank back against the mattress, frustrated wants nudging at him. He ignored them, listened to Obi-Wan’s slow, steady breathing, and slept.

#

Anakin had thought they’d have at least a few days of quiet, on the homestead. But he heard the whine of approaching vehicles the next day, and his stomach dropped out. Obi-Wan heard them, too, straightening and wiping sweat off of his brow, saying, “They’ve found me. I need to--”

“Come on,” Anakin said, not interested in listening to Obi-Wan’s plan to go die to spare the rest of them again. He grabbed Obi-Wan’s arm and pulled him along. “I’ve already hidden the speeder. Owen helped me lay some false tracks this morning. Let them come, ask some questions, and move on.”

“They’re going to notice  _ me _ ,” Obi-Wan said, sounding amused, and Anakin shot him a look.

“No, they’re not.” He ducked into the main house, finding Cliegg with Luke in his arms, rocking the baby back and forth. He had a plan, a plan that would not work if Luke woke up and decided to wail, and… Well.

All babies looked pretty much the same, didn’t they? His mother turned to look at him, bent over the moisture processor, and he said, “We’re about to have company. They’re going to be looking for Ben and me. I’m taking him to my old hiding spot. Luke can--”

“We’ll take care of Luke,” his mother said, wiping her hands on a rag hung at her waist. “Go, get him hidden.” She was calling for Beru as Anakin pulled Ben down the hall and kicked a place in the wall, opening the little door built into it. Most homes in the area had a smuggler’s hold, or two. Anakin had made this one his, long ago. He used to crawl in and hide when the whole world got to be too much.

It used to be bigger, he considered, looking at the small, dark space beyond. Obi-Wan glanced at him and said, “We’ll never fit.”

“Sure we will,” Anakin said, not believing it, and ducked, scrambling through. He pressed his back against the wall, sitting with his legs curled up awkwardly, his feet wedged against the other side of the space, the roof brushing his head. “Come here.”

Obi-Wan stared at him, looked to the side - the sound of engines was markedly louder - and swore before climbing in. There was nowhere for him to  _ go _ , really. Anakin swallowed a grunt when he got a knee in the side, and then Obi-Wan was  _ over  _ him and Anakin hadn’t thought this through at all.

“Stay quiet,” Owen said, from the outside, and shut the door.

Anakin exhaled in the dark space. He could feel Obi-Wan’s breath against his cheek, but it was utterly dark. One of Obi-Wan’s hands was braced on the wall over his shoulder, holding his weight up. His legs were on either side of Anakin’s hips. “Well,” he said, quiet, amused, shifting a bit, “we fit, I suppose.”

Anakin bit his bottom lip and reached up, gripping at Obi-Wan’s hips to hold him still. He hissed, “Stop squirming.”

“Squirming?” Obi-Wan moved again, and Anakin tightened his grip. “I’m just trying to--” He cut off entirely at the sound of knocking on the front door. They sat there, frozen, in the dark. He listened to Obi-Wan breathe, a strand of Obi-Wan’s hair fallen forward to brush his skin, and he couldn’t move enough to dislodge it.

The room wasn’t soundproof. Anakin heard his mother greeting their unwelcome visitors. He heard her offer them a drink, heard them decline. He listened to her introduce her daughter-in-law, Beru, and her new baby. He listened to them ask after a man with copper hair, a beard, probably wounded, who would have come through, perhaps a day ago. Maybe two.

And his mother, Force bless her, had learned to lie well and thoroughly long ago. No, she told them, she hadn’t seen any such man. Her son had visited, but had not stayed, though she missed him dearly. He’d set off into the hills, on a longer trip, and did they want to stay for supper, she was sure they could scrounge something up.

The troopers declined the generous offer, but they would like to search the premises, they said. It was for his mother’s safety, they said. The man they were looking for was dangerous, and could have been hiding without their knowledge. His mother shrugged, indifference in her tone when she gave her permission. 

Anakin held his breath as they went by, sure they’d be able to hear the beating of his heart, but, apparently, they could not. It felt like the search took forever. Long enough for sweat to gather down Anakin’s spine, for his thoughts to drift back to Obi-Wan’s body so close to his.

He caught himself absently rubbing his thumb back and forth across the skin of Obi-Wan’s stomach only when Obi-Wan sucked in a little breath, skin jumping under his touch. Anakin couldn’t apologize, wouldn’t risk the noise, but he stilled the touch, ignoring the urge to pull Obi-Wan down against him.

Someone was going to open the door keeping them in, sooner or later. Anakin held onto that thought, ignoring the want surging through him. They didn’t move, staying tucked away, until the engines turned on again and faded off into the distance.

Anakin sagged as they did, his heart still racing along. Obi-Wan shifted, too, tension going out of him with a breath, the muscles in his thighs relaxing, and Anakin realized too late he needed to tighten his grip and keep him  _ up _ . Obi-Wan made a soft little sound, settling against him, and Anakin swore he could see the curious tilt of Obi-Wan’s head when he asked, under his breath, “Is that… your blaster?”

“You know exactly what it is,” Anakin gritted back, resisting the urge to grind up. His  _ mother  _ was probably going to open the door any moment. Obi-Wan shifted again, the kriffer, and Anakin leaned forward in the dark, because if Obi-Wan was going to squirm  _ in his lap _ , Anakin needed to kiss him, as light washed in around them.

“They’re gone,” his mother said, her worry enough to kill some of the fire in Anakin’s blood. “You can come out.”

#

Waking up in his old bed was never going to feel normal, Anakin supposed. But he’d gotten used to waking up beside Obi-Wan. It jerked him out of a drowsy daze the next morning when he woke up and found Obi-Wan missing. He sat up, sure, suddenly, that Obi-Wan had gone to give himself up to the troopers, and--

And he was sitting in a brief space of emptiness on Anakin’s floor, his legs folded and his hands on his knees, his eyes closed and his head bowed. It was only the small hours of the morning. The first of the suns wouldn’t be rising yet. His absence had woken Anakin more effectively than any alarm.

Anakin watched him, for a long moment, while his pulse returned to a normal level. He looked peaceful. Calm. Anakin swung his legs off the bunk, and Obi-Wan said, without opening his eyes, “I’m meditating.”

“It’s a Jedi thing?” Anakin asked, rubbing sleep away from his eyes.

“Mm.” Obi-Wan opened his eyes, then, barely visible in the dark room. “Yes.” He paused there, taking a breath before he continued. “You’re sensitive to the Force. Very much so.”

“So I’ve been told.” Anakin looked to the side. Thoughts of Master Qui-Gon no longer filled him with raw anger, but it still hurt. He shook that aside. “Master Qui-Gon said something about midi-chlorians and…” He waved a hand to the side.

“I could teach you. A bit. About the Force.” Obi-Wan spoke carefully, hesitant with each word. Anakin looked back at him and found his expression unreadable. The idea held a certain deep appeal. Anakin had always wondered, had dreamed of being a Jedi for years after he claimed he’d stopped.

“You want to teach me to meditate?” he asked, trying not to sound over-excited at the prospect of learning something - anything - about the parts of him that weren’t normal.

“Among other things,” Obi-Wan said, and, really, Anakin couldn’t agree fast enough. Perhaps that was a failing on his part, but the thought of finding out more about the Force  _ and  _ getting instruction from Obi-Wan was, truly, too good to pass up.

He assumed the meditation would be boring, but it wasn’t so bad, really, when Obi-Wan took him out into the sand the next morning. “We’ll need more space than in your room,” he said, as explanation, “and the dunes are quiet.”

Anakin hated the sand, but didn’t protest too much when Obi-Wan had them sit, placing Anakin just so with careful hands. Anakin’s pulse sped when Obi-Wan put a hand on his chin, tilting his head to, apparently, the most appropriate angle.

Meditation came not easily to Anakin. Mostly he thought about Obi-Wan when his thoughts were supposed to be still, but he tried, and kept trying, and perhaps Obi-Wan was an excellent teacher, because he thought he started to get the hang of it, after a few mornings. He asked, still sitting on the sand, “You’ve trained people before. Had an apprentice?”

Obi-Wan went still. Freezing, as though trying to avoid detection from some large predator. Anakin - freshly attuned to the world around - felt the jolt of pain like a physical attack. None of it came through in Obi-Wan’s voice when he said, “Yes. Two, in fact.”

Anakin watched him as he stared at nothing out across the sands. “Two?” he asked, because Obi-Wan wasn’t walking off, so maybe he wanted to talk about this. Maybe he needed to talk about it. “At the same time?”

Obi-Wan’s mouth curved, but only briefly. “No. No -- I was given an apprentice, shortly after Master Qui-Gon’s death. We worked together for many years but he - he - when the war started. There was a great battle. Led by a Sith. My apprentice charged ahead, he was only young, and…” Obi-Wan cut off, his throat working convulsively.

“I’m sorry,” Anakin said, and was, feeling naked agony radiating out of Obi-Wan’s heart. “This Sith, did you….?”

Obi-Wan closed his eyes for a moment. “I killed him, yes,” Obi-Wan said, voice tight and tired. “But only recently. Shortly before I crashed, in fact.” Anakin was beginning to think Obi-Wan was a singular threat to Sith around the galaxy. No wonder the troopers were hunting him so fiercely.

It was impressive, though Anakin could barely focus on the fact that he was sitting across from a man who had - on his own - killed two Sith lords while the rest of the universe fell to them. Too much pain was still coming off of Obi-Wan, and Anakin considered the words not said. He swallowed. “And your other apprentice?”

“Ahsoka,” Obi-Wan said, quietly. “She - she came to me a few months into the war. And I tried to protect her, but - but she was not with me, when the end came, and…” He trailed off, breathing raggedly, and Anakin reached out to curl fingers around his hand, squeezing, gently. “I can’t feel her,” Obi-Wan said, low. He sounded empty and beaten. “But… but I could not feel her for some time. She left the Order. Before this all happened.” 

“Maybe she made it, too,” Anakin said, and Obi-Wan closed his eyes, as though even the suggestion of hope was too much for him to bear. “Hey, if  _ you  _ trained her, she’s got a pretty good chance.”

Obi-Wan nodded, briefly, without opening his eyes. He said, after clearing his throat, “I should tell you more about the Force.”

#

The next days passed relatively peacefully. No more troopers swung by the homestead, anyway. Anakin hoped they’d be thoroughly distracted by the wild bantha chase they’d been sent on. If the Force decided to cut everyone a break, the Sand People would find them and they’d never walk out of the desert again.

Being back on the farmstead left him feeling off-balance. He’d never fitted in there properly, even with work to do. There was plenty of that, at least. The sand and heat were always gumming up the equipment. Anakin ended up wedged under and between processors and collectors most of the hours of the day, because the work needed done and it kept his hands busy.

It didn’t solely occupy his thoughts, which was a major problem.

He had too much time to think about Obi-Wan, and, really, nothing else to think about. He wasn’t sure exactly where they stood. He’d  _ never  _ been sure where they stood. There hadn’t been time to think about it, until he was waist deep in a ventilator, his knuckles banged bloody, going over everything that had happened since he met Obi-Wan for the thirtieth time.

Half of his choices seemed insane, but, at the same time, he couldn’t imagine doing anything differently. He couldn’t have left Obi-Wan to die in the ship. Couldn’t very well have let him die of his injuries on Anakin’s bed. Couldn’t have let the troopers find him and kill him….

That all seemed clear enough. At each point, there’d been only one option before him that made any sense at all. The way he felt about Obi-Wan, the things he wanted, also seemed clear enough to him.

He wanted, desperately, to put his hands all over Obi-Wan’s skin, to feel the coiled strength there, the raw power he’d seen displayed once or twice. The thought of touching him was like imagining grabbing one of the massive thunderstorms that moved through on the hottest days with both hands, wrangling it close, riding through it on a speed bike.

It left him aching with hot wants.

He just… wasn’t at all sure what Obi-Wan wanted from  _ him _ . Obi-Wan flirted, he was sure of that. But it seemed half a reflexive action. He did the same thing with Beru and Owen and, even, Anakin’s mother and Cliegg, once or twice. 

Obi-Wan slept in his bunk, they shared body heat and a cramped mattress, but nothing more than that. He  _ knew  _ Obi-Wan had felt the obvious expression of his interest at least twice. They just didn’t talk about it. 

Anakin wrenched harder on a bolt than necessary, scowling. He was obviously going to have to be the one to bring the situation up. He felt better for deciding, right up until he finally made his way free of the machine - the clog removed - and straightened to find Obi-Wan walking through the door.

He knew he was filthy, covered with grease and dust. He’d peeled off his shirt earlier, both to protect the clothing and as a stop gap measure against the heat. Obi-Wan looked him up and down and then looked away to say, “Your mother sent me to check on you. She was worried you’d fallen in.”

“Not this time,” Anakin said, reaching for a washrag and scrubbing at his hands. The grease was mingled with blood, and he hissed when he brushed off a scab. 

“You’re hurt,” Obi-Wan said, moving closer, reaching out and taking Anakin’s hand, a frown on his face. Anakin jerked in a breath and held it. Obi-Wan’s hands were smaller than his, but marked with scars and calluses. Strong and capable. 

Anakin said, voice pitched too rough, “It’s nothing.”

Obi-Wan snorted, curling one hand over Anakin’s knuckles, “There’s no need to suffer.” His skin tingled, a sharp sort of sting that faded after a moment. “Much better,” Obi-wan said, moving his hand away, and Anakin glanced down at his closed skin, pinkish and new across his knuckles.

“Thank you,” he managed, after a moment, very aware of how close they were still standing.

“It’s the least I could do,” Obi-Wan said, looking up, a rueful smile on his mouth. “After all you’ve done to help me.”

Anakin had spent the entire day thinking about him. Standing so close to him was making it difficult to think. He shook his head. “I didn’t help you out to get anything back.”

Obi-Wan’s expression shifted. He said, “I know exactly why you did it.”

Anakin jerked his gaze away, a reflexive denial cutting across his thoughts. He shook his head, hating to remember that he had, at first, considered turning Obi-Wan in for a bounty. “Listen, I know it’s probably not impressive enough for the Jedi, but trying to make a few credits isn’t--”

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan said, quietly, taking his other hand and smoothing his thumb across Anakin’s battered knuckles. “I know you never had any intention of selling me to the GAR.”

“Oh, really?” Anakin  _ had  _ thought about it. At least briefly. For a second or two. “Then why’d I go to all this trouble?”

Obi-Wan released his hand, the pain all gone, and looked up at him, straight on, eyes clear and sharp. “You helped me because you thought it was the right thing to do. Every step of the way. Because you saw someone in need and it moved you  _ here _ ,” he reached out, almost touching Anakin’s chest. “Because you didn’t want to see Luke or I come to any harm, even if it cost you dearly. Because you  _ care _ .”

Anakin swallowed. Caring didn’t get anyone very far on Tatooine. But he couldn’t argue any of the points. He’d always been weak that way. He glanced to the side, jaw clenching, and said, “Maybe I just did it because I want you.”

“Well, you do want me,” Obi-Wan said, and the sheer surety with which he said it made Anakin look back. Obi-Wan was watching him, head cocked to the side. “You’ve hardly kept it a secret, Anakin. But that’s not why you’ve helped.”

Anakin figured arguing with someone who could sense his feelings, was probably a losing prospect. More effective to move past that. To charge forward. Charging forward was what he was  _ good  _ at. “Maybe not,” he said, shifting a bit, putting a hand on the bench by Obi-Wan’s hip. “Does it bother you that I want you?”

“Bother me?” Obi-Wan looked thoughtful, as though he had to give the question serious consideration. He was still looking thoughtful when Anakin moved, putting his other hand on the bench, bracketing Obi-Wan in. “No. Though I’m unsure of the appeal and--”

“Do you want  _ me _ ?” Anakin asked, because if he didn’t say something he was going to get far too distracted by the  _ appeal _ , currently gazing up at him with the bluest eyes he’d ever seen. Obi-Wan shut his mouth, gaze sliding down and up again and, oh, he  _ did _ . Anakin knew that expression.

“I - you are, of course, very--”

Anakin decided that he could find out what he was  _ very  _ later. He curled lower, ducking his head, and kissed Obi-Wan’s mouth, because they both  _ wanted _ , and Force, if Anakin had to go another moment walking around, wanting, he might go mad. 

Obi-Wan’s mouth was soft. He made a little sound, surprised, against Anakin’s lips, and Anakin swallowed it. And then Obi-Wan turned his face to the side, breaking the kiss, and said, “No, I apologize for the miscommunication, my Order --”

“Your Order?” Anakin asked, thrown off balance so utterly that he could barely string a thought together. “The Jedi?”

“Yes, them,” Obi-Wan said, and he sounded almost amused, though it was a sharp sort of humor. “I…” he gestured. “Can’t.”

Anakin stared at the side of his head. “Your Order fell,” he said, and grimaced when Obi-Wan flinched. “I’m sorry. I didn’t-- But, there isn’t a Jedi Order anymore, from what you told me, Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan looked at him, the humor gone from his expression, replaced by a deep sadness. “But I’m still a Jedi. I’m sorry. If you wish me to leave, now, I will. It would be safer for your family, in any case, and--”

“Kriffing hell.” Anakin scrubbed a hand up over his face, pieces slotting into place in his mind all at once. “Are you  _ turning me down  _ because you think I’ll be okay with you going to sacrifice yourself, then?”

Obi-Wan stared at him, expression impassive, but Anakin knew things, sometimes, too. More than he used to, with Obi-Wan’s instruction. Maybe he couldn’t read people as easily as Obi-Wan, but he knew when he was right. He shook his head, taking a step back, barking a sharp laugh. “I - I care about you. And Luke. Just because you don’t want me, it doesn’t change anything.”

Well, it changed the hope in Anakin’s chest to a deep sort of pain, but whatever. He’d known, from the start, that he didn’t have much to offer someone like Obi-Wan. He was just a mechanic who ended up over his head more often than not, never even been off Tatooine, a slave boy who never made good.

He turned, not wanting Obi-Wan - who’d been a General, who was a Jedi, who could do things Anakin could barely imagine - to see his face. “Anakin,” Obi-Wan called after him, but Anakin waved a hand, and kept walking, out of the building, into the sand, needing nothing but the sky around him, for a while.

Maybe he’d try meditation.

#

Anakin didn’t come back until after the evening meal. He needed the hot air burning in his lungs and against his skin. He only returned when the suns set and the air turned bitter cold. He expected to find Obi-Wan asleep already, but he was awake, sitting on the bed with his back bowed over, his elbows on his knees. “There you are,” he said, when Anakin entered the room, without looking up.

“Here I am,” Anakin agreed, gooseflesh all over his skin. 

Obi-Wan sighed and stood, making to move past him. “I’ll sleep in the speeder. That way you can--”

Anakin caught his arm. “Sleep here,” he said. “You’ll freeze out there.”

Obi-Wan stood silent for a moment. “I don’t want to make things difficult on you,” he said, quietly, and Anakin snorted, just a little.

“I don’t mind,” he said, the great realization he’d had out on the sands. He should have, maybe. He’d done so much, helped Obi-Wan, kept him alive, but it wasn’t - that didn’t entitle him to things Obi-Wan didn’t want to give him. “I care about you, Obi-Wan. You and Luke. That’s not going to go away, just because…” He waved a hand to the side.

Obi-Wan made a little sound, almost hurt. He said, half a whisper, “It’s not that I don’t want you.”

And that sent a sharp little thrill down Anakin’s spine. He sucked in a breath, chilled skin hyper aware of the warmth coming off of Obi-Wan. He prompted, when Obi-Wan stayed silent, “But?”

Obi-Wan swallowed. He heard it. “But I’m - I may be the last member of my Order. The only survivor. I…” He pressed his eyes closed, grimacing. “If I step from the path, there will be no one left. The Jedi will truly be gone.” The grief in his voice filled up the space between them with loss. Anakin tried to imagine losing everyone he’d cared about, kriff, tried to imagine what it would have done to lose his mother to the Sand People, and shuddered.

Obi-Wan kept all the grief inside him, so much of the time. Seeing even a sliver of it was horrible. Anakin swore under his breath, wrapping an arm around Obi-Wan, drawing him closer, hearing him gasp, a wet, choked-on sound.

Anakin had not seen him weep, had not seen him shed a single tear, even with his body torn to pieces. But he wept, silently, against Anakin’s shoulder, and it was shocking and heartbreaking, all at once.

The people of Tatooine wept rarely. Water was a precious thing. But Obi-Wan had cause, better reason than anyone Anakin had known, and so he did not begrudge the tears. Anakin only curled closer around him, humming under his breath, the songs his mother used to sing when he was punished, his body all full of a pain he knew to be unfair.

And he could have said:  _ you can’t keep the Jedi Order alive on your own _ . He could have said:  _ your Order is gone, no matter what you do _ . But those words would have meant nothing, no matter how true they were, not in that moment.

They’d have only been cruel.

He nudged Obi-Wan towards the bed, when he grew still, just breathing damply against Anakin’s chest. “I’ve made a mess of you,” Obi-Wan said, tone gone numb and flat. 

“I don’t mind,” Anakin told him, again, directing him down, curling behind him, listening to him breathe until he fell asleep.

#

Anakin didn’t broach the subject of all the things he wanted again. Obi-Wan knew. He could do with that knowledge what he wanted. But he didn’t bother to hide it, either. Obi-Wan hadn’t asked him to, and Force knew Obi-Wan flirted with anything that moved.

The last of Obi-Wan’s wounds healed. Luke started sitting up on his own. The troopers came back through, reporting a failure on their scouting expedition, leaving a comm device in case anyone saw the fugitive. 

Their neighbors - meaning the nearest moisture farmers, half a day’s speeder drive away - visited occasionally. They assumed Obi-Wan to be Anakin’s husband, and he saw no reason to correct them. It would be a safe enough cover, if and when the troopers came back, even if the words made him freeze as they were uttered.

He’d never really thought about getting married. It hadn’t been on his radar. Getting a ship and getting off-world were far more important. His affairs had tended to be brief, burning hot and fast, leaving just ashes behind.

But it seemed oddly natural to have people assume Obi-Wan was his, and Luke, too. 

Maybe it didn’t to Obi-Wan, who stood frowning in their room that evening, looking to the side when he said, “You don’t want to be here. You left this place, before.”

Anakin shrugged, pushing his hair back. It was getting too long by far, but he kept forgetting to cut it. “I don’t want to be on Tatooine,” he said. “Period.”

He felt Obi-Wan staring at him, watching him carefully. “You could go back, now. To the city.”

Anakin exhaled, sprawling out onto his back. He’d thought about it, more than once. Each day on the homestead left him feeling a little more stir crazy. He shrugged. “All my things will be gone by now,” he said. “They were all gone the day I left, no doubt. And it would be dangerous for you and Luke. Someone would recognize you.”

“Anakin.” Obi-Wan sighed, staying on the other side of the room. “You don’t have to keep looking after us.”

“I know.” Anakin closed his eyes. He could go back. He could start over. He could rebuild his savings. He could get offworld and never think about Obi-Wan and Luke again. Well. He wasn’t so sure about that last one. They’d made a home for themselves, inside his chest. The thought of leaving never got very far, because leaving meant he wouldn’t be waking up beside Obi-Wan anymore, wouldn’t be able to watch Luke laugh and pull Cliegg’s hair. “I  _ like  _ looking after you.”

Obi-Wan made a little sound, punched out, and Anakin got a feeling from him, just briefly, something deep and thick, quickly buried again.

#

Anakin woke up the next morning wondering, seriously, if he’d be a moisture farmer for the rest of his life. If he’d look into the land his mother wanted him to buy - another neighbor was moving away, finally getting off-world - and set up a farm of his own, raise Luke beside Obi-Wan, tension moving always between them, there but left ignored.

The frightening thing was, he turned the idea over and  _ didn’t  _ want to go jump in the speeder to light out for Mos Eisley, the closest port, as quickly as possible. He rolled onto his side, staring at the back of Obi-Wan’s neck, the soft strands of hair against his skin - Obi-Wan kept his hair trimmed short, almost religiously - a few freckles visible above his collar, and ached.

He wanted to shift forward and kiss each inch of soft skin, but he couldn’t. And it wasn’t all he wanted, was only a part of it. He sat, scrubbing at his face, and lifted Luke when he started fussing, gurgling nonsense words and waving his chubby arms.

“You’ve got to stop getting up so early, kid,” he complained, and received only a laugh for his trouble, Luke reaching up to grab his hair and pull. His mother smiled at him, wide and so pleased it made the center of his chest hurt, when he stepped out into the main room, and he thought maybe it wouldn’t be impossibly terrible to stay.

That was before the proximity sensors he’d rigged up went off. That was before Obi-Wan burst out of their room at a run, radiating shock and anxiety, not slowing on his way out the front door. He didn’t even grab his boots, moving with unnatural speed.

Anakin followed, Luke still in his arms, grabbing his blaster as he went.

There was smoke rising past the compound: dark, oily smoke. Engine fire, Anakin thought, watching heat warping the air. Obi-Wan was running towards it, flat out, so quickly he barely seemed to touch the sand. He turned the corner around the refining shed, and Anakin swore, trying to match his speed.

No one had ever told him Jedi were so kriffing  _ fast _ .

He made it around the corner and almost plowed into Obi-Wan’s back, because he had frozen there, in view of a downed ship with markings Anakin didn’t know on the side. Didn’t look like a GAR shuttle. Anakin reached out, touching Obi-Wan’s shoulder, and he made a gutted sound, jerking into motion again.

The hatch to the ship opened before he reached it, rising and belching out more smoke into the air. A figure stumbled out, tall, with horns of some kind, coughing, and Obi-Wan cried out, “Ahsoka!”

The figure, a woman - a girl, really, Togruta, Anakin thought - jerked towards him, stumbling in his direction, still coughing. She stretched an arm out, and Obi-Wan was there, careful hands on her side and shoulder, demanding, “What happened, are you alright, what--”

He cut off when she slumped forward into him, arms wrapped around him, her face smashed against his shoulder. Anakin eased closer, blaster still in hand, heart racing in his chest. The girl - Ahsoka - was saying, “I found you, I found you, I found you.” It sounded like she might be weeping.

“You’re alive,” Obi-Wan gasped, half-laughing, one of his arms slung around her. His expression looked stunned, dumb with relief. Anakin looked away - the expression looked private - and saw movement in the smoke of the ship. “Ahsoka, how--”

Someone stepped forward, in the smoke. Someone wearing white armor. Anakin jerked even with Obi-Wan, then a step past him, blaster coming up as he snapped, “That’s far enough!”

“Wait!” Ahsoka yelled, jerking back from Obi-Wan, putting her body in front of the trooper who was leaning against the hatch, bleeding heavily from a head wound. She spread her arms. “Wait! He’s - he’s okay, he won’t hurt you, I promise!”

“Captain?” Obi-Wan asked, shifting, as though to walk forward. Anakin shouldered him to the side to keep him back. 

The trooper gave a tired wave, trying to come to attention and not quite making it. He said, his voice a rasp, “General. Knew you’d make it out alive, sir, if anyone could.”

Obi-Wan looked back and forth between them and reached out, resting a hand on Anakin’s arm, pushing the blaster downward. “What - what’s going on? How did you find me?”

“It’s a long story, Master,” Ahsoka said, flashing a smile. “And I’ll be very happy to tell you. But can we sit down, first?”

#

Obi-Wan insisted it was alright to bring Ahsoka and the trooper - turned out his name was Rex - into the house. He vouched for them with his life, he said, and Anakin could only shrug. “This is Anakin,” Obi-Wan said, pulling one of Ahsoka’s arms over his shoulders and turning her towards the house. “He saved my life, when I crashed here.”

“Nice to meet you, Anakin,” Ahsoka said, flashing him a smile that looked like it hurt, and Anakin nodded at her. He didn’t know what to say, and kept right on not knowing what to say as they brought their guests inside, got them sat down and appropriately fussed over, given water while Owen went to fetch medical supplies.

Obi-Wan stood with his arms folded, almost vibrating with motion contained and kept still. Luke squirmed around; it was too much excitement for so early in the morning. Anakin watched Ahsoka drain a glass of water in a few seconds, before she slumped in her chair, and flashed Obi-Wan a tired smile. “I can’t believe I found you,” she said.

“Neither can I,” Obi-Wan said, shaking his head. “What have you been up to?”

Ahsoka looked over at Rex before she spoke, and between the two of them they spilled out a story. Parts of it Anakin had heard before, about the troopers turning on their own, about a great slaughter. “Rex and some of his brothers, they figured out a way around the - they have chips in their heads, Master, and they figured out how to disable them. They’re alright.”

“But the rest?” Obi-Wan asked, tending to a wound on her shoulder with careful hands, the movements speaking of long familiarity. They’d gently shooed away the rest of Anakin’s family, after receiving the medical supplies. Anakin thought no one had gone far. He could feel their curiosity. 

Ahsoka shook her head. “I think they’re… I think they’re just lost.”

They shared a moment of silence as Obi-Wan wrung out the rag and grabbed a bacta patch. “So,” Ahsoka said, as he pressed it to her skin, “Rex and me, we made it off of Mandalore.” She jerked her thumb towards the door. “Ran, hid. Stole a few ships. We had some help. There are… there’s people out there, planning to fight back against what’s happening. A rebellion. We were on our way to find them when we caught word about you. And it seemed worth… trying to track you here.” She looked up at him. “I’m so glad you’re alive.”

Obi-Wan reached out and squeezed her hand, smiling, his eyes shining when he said, “You, too. I can’t even tell you how…” He trailed off, swallowing, and turned to Rex. “Let’s see to your head, Captain.”

“Just Rex now,” he said, closing his eyes as Obi-Wan tilted his head to the side. “I left that all behind.”

Obi-Wan nodded, swallowing, and Anakin watched him gently clean and bandage the wound, listened to them talk about things he’d never seen, watching the way they fit together with an ache in his gut.

This was the life Obi-Wan was used to. These were the people who knew him. The people he loved. His Padawan, returned from the grave.

“We really wanted to pick you up and take you with us, Master,” Ahsoka said, finally. She frowned, mouth twisting unhappily. “Find this rebellion, all together, you know? But that old piece of scrap is never going to fly again. I don’t know what we’re going to do.”

Anakin swallowed. He hadn’t said anything for a long time, just listening to them, unsure why he’d even been included. He didn’t belong in the life they’d led. He shifted from his position against the wall and said, “Oh, I bet I can make her fly.”

Ahsoka turned to blink at him and then looked over at Obi-Wan, who nodded. “Anakin’s the best mechanic I’ve ever met,” he said, and then glanced at Anakin. “You don’t mind looking the ship over?”

Anakin shivered, down his spine. Looking the ship over meant fixing it. Fixing it meant giving Obi-Wan a way off of Tatooine. Away from him. It would put Anakin’s life back to normal, he supposed. He twisted his mouth up in the corners. “Of course not,” he said. “Let’s go see what we’ve got.”

#

They left Ahsoka and Rex resting in the storage shed. Neither looked like they could stay on their feet anymore. Beru and Owen were circling around, when Anakin left, curiosity radiating off of them. 

Anakin ducked into the ship first. He’d walked a step ahead of Obi-Wan the entire way. He didn’t want, necessarily, for Obi-Wan to see his face. “I can do this on my own,” he said, frowning around the interior. “You can go spend some more time with Ahsoka.”

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan said, catching his arm, and Obi-Wan initiated a touch so rarely that Anakin froze into place, turning to look at him in the smoked out ship. He expected a kind and heartfelt thank-you, for all his help. He expected, maybe, a brief kiss across a cheek. Obi-Wan said, “If you can get this ship to fly again - I know you had savings that you lost, for me. I know you want to get off this planet. You could - you could come with us. Take the ship, once we find this rebellion, go wherever you want.”

Anakin stared at him, the words so far from what he had expected that he couldn’t think, could barely breathe. Obi-Wan shifted, glanced to the side and back, and asked, “Anakin? Does that sound--”

“What if I don’t want to take off once you find the rebellion?” Anakin asked, grinding his jaw to the side, meeting Obi-Wan’s gaze. 

Obi-Wan stared back at him, his fingers still clenched around Anakin’s arm. He said, “It will likely be an incredibly dangerous experience, almost certainly doomed to failure, I don’t want you to feel that you  _ have-- _ ”

“I said what if I want to,” Anakin interrupted, reaching up to cup Obi-Wan’s jaw, the way he knew he shouldn’t. But Obi-Wan was giving him the option to go with him out into the stars. He was opening a door, and Anakin wanted to race through it. “What if I want to stick with you, Obi-Wan? You and Luke?”

Obi-Wan wasn’t blinking, just staring up at him, breath coming fast and shallow. He said, “Anakin, I--”

And Ahsoka said, ducking her head into the ship, “I remembered that I needed to warn you that --oh! I didn’t, I’m sorry, I’ll--”

“Warn us about what?” Obi-Wan asked, taking a step back from Anakin, who gritted his teeth and resisted the urge to bang the side of his fist against the nearest flat surface. Ahsoka was staring at him, her eyes wide and surprised, and she kept looking as she stepped in to tell him about an intake valve that he would have noticed was a problem all on his own.

#

“So,” his mother said, later, bringing him out a plate of dinner as he poked and prodded his way through the engine. It was fixable. It wasn’t going to be a  _ pretty  _ fix, but the ship would fly again. Anakin would get off Tatooine. And there was no way he was leaving Obi-Wan with some rebellion. Obi-Wan, obviously, could not be trusted to look after himself. “Who is Ben, exactly?”

Anakin grimaced, looking over at her. “He’s just--”

“Anakin,” she said. “We’ve all known he wasn’t exactly some poor soul you happened to decide to help out. We’ve let it go. But with all this…” She waved a hand, wrinkling her nose at the mostly deconstructed engine. “I think we have the right to know.”

Anakin sighed, leaning back against the side of the engine casing. He had days of work to do, and likely not that long to complete it all. After all, if Ahsoka had managed to find Obi-Wan, it stood to reason that someone else would, sooner rather than later. He resisted the urge to rub his face with his greasy hands.

He said, finally, “You remember the Jedi we met when I was little?”

His mother blinked. “Yes. What’s that got to--”

“Ben is - was a Jedi, too.” Anakin blurted the words. “He was a General in the war. His name is Obi-Wan, really.”

He didn’t look up to see how she took the words. It seemed better to get his hands back in the engine. He had so much work to finish up, after all. She sighed. “Well, that makes much more sense.” She was quiet for another moment, before adding. “You’re leaving with them, aren’t you?”

He grimaced. “Mom--”

“I know you’ve always wanted to go, Ani,” she said, reaching out to gently brush his hair back from his face. “A part of you has, anyway. But another part of you was always afraid to go.”

He  _ did  _ look up, then, frowning. “No, I just couldn’t get--”

Her small, fond smile silenced him. He looked to the side, chest aching, when she said, “I know you, Anakin. You could have stowed away aboard any ship if the only thing you wanted was to leave.” She cupped his cheek, drawing his gaze back, looking into his eyes. “But you’ve found something you want enough to go.”

His ribs felt too small, looking up at her. His mother, the only person he’d had for so long. It had just been them, even after they’d moved out to the homestead, it had only been them for Anakin. He said, “If you don’t want me to go…” He didn’t know, actually, what he’d  _ do  _ if she didn’t want him to go.

He had a terrible feeling he’d go, anyway. Obi-Wan and Luke were… his responsibility, in a way. He’d dragged them out of that ship, he’d saved their lives, binding them all together. He couldn’t imagine watching Obi-Wan go away without him.

But she shook her head, that soft smile still playing at her mouth. “I’m going to worry about you,” she said. “Running around out in the galaxy with a  _ Jedi _ .” She shook her head. “Or two of them, I suppose. But I always knew you were meant for bigger things than this, Ani. Besides, they need someone looking after them.”

She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to the crown of his head.

#

The homestead buzzed with activity over the next few days. Anakin enlisted anyone he happened to catch to assist with the ship. It required him to cannibalize the speeder and a few of his other projects, taking parts as needed, making them work.

Ahsoka was far more useful, in the long run, than Beru and Owen, who spent too much of their time staring wide-eyed at everything. Ahsoka asked questions, but picked up on what Anakin needed her to do quickly. Rex spent most of the following days recovering, though he insisted on trying to help.

Obi-Wan tried to help, too, until Anakin sent him away. “I’m sorry,” Ahsoka said, after Obi-Wan left, apologizing again for nudging the hyperdrive wrong, “he’s always been hopeless with mechanics.”

Anakin shrugged, glancing over at her. They’d not spoken, much. He couldn’t fathom what to say to her. “Yeah?” seemed to be an adequate response, one that didn’t require him to navigate the conversational waters between them.

“Mm.” Anakin figured that might be all they said to one another, but she had other questions, as they worked. He caught her watching him, sometimes, out of the corners of her eyes, something curious in her expression. It wasn’t much of a surprise when she said, “So, you saved Master Obi-Wan’s life, huh?”

He reset a socket and shrugged. “I guess.” He shifted, an itch between his shoulder blades when he said, “You still call him master.” He didn’t like that terminology, not at all.

“Oh, yeah,” she glanced at him and away again. “I guess it must seem - I guess he told you I left the Order, before all this. So I don’t… have to, anymore, I suppose. But I didn’t leave because of him. He was - I mean.” She sighed, folding her forearms on the deck and resting her forehead on them. “I don’t remember my family. Or my father. But Master Obi-Wan…” She shifted her shoulders. “It just feels… normal. To call him that.”

Anakin nodded. He’d had no father, at all. Cliegg had never slotted into that role. Maybe if Qui-Gon Jinn had taken him off of Tatooine… But he hadn’t. And Anakin had gotten by alright without a father figure.

“Anyway,” she said, lifting her head, “I’m glad you found him. Thank you. For what you did.”

“It was nothing,” Anakin said, lying through his teeth, grabbing a torch to patch in a piece of machinery lifted from the speeder. He felt her watching him, but after a while she stopped, at least for the moment.

She watched him a lot, Obi-Wan’s returned apprentice. She glanced at him out of the corners of her eyes when they were eating, and when he followed Obi-Wan into their room, and through the busy days, and rarely looked away when Anakin caught her and met her gaze.

She was young, mostly an adult but not quite, but she looked at him like she’d seen the worst the galaxy had to offer and that he didn’t measure up. She’d fought a war, after all, fought it beside Obi-Wan.

No wonder she didn’t look very impressed when Anakin looked up from handing Luke over to Obi-Wan one evening, and found her staring. She just seemed surprised, her eyes wide, and why wouldn’t she be? Surprise was probably the logical reaction to someone like him standing too close to someone like Obi-Wan.

Anakin swallowed, and looked away from her, first.

#

Anakin threw himself into repairing the ship. Machines, he understood. Machines made  _ sense _ . Jedi didn’t. He emerged, sometimes, when he needed to sleep or eat. Once, he slipped out to find the suns just starting to come up, his eyes itching and a headache in the back of his skull. 

He moved across the sand, intending to go see if Obi-Wan wanted to meditate and then get his head down for a few hours, and stilled at the sound of faint voices. Obi-Wan and Ahsoka. He held his breath. They were up ahead, sitting on the roof of one of the moisture sheds, staring out across the sands, shoulders touching.

Anakin knew he should keep walking, probably. He stayed put, instead, in the shadow of the garage, listening to the rise and fall of their voices. “--is gone,” Ahsoka was saying, her face tilted up to the sky. “We can’t bring it back.”

“We can’t just let it die,” Obi-Wan said, equally quiet. “Thousands of years of history stand behind us, Ahsoka.”

She shrugged. “I’m not saying let it die. Just… let it change. The Order has changed before, Master. When necessary. We can’t go back to what was. If we’re - if we’re going to keep the Jedi alive, we’ll have to adjust.”

He made a soft, amused sound. “I’m sure you have some ideas on what those changes might be.”

“A few,” she said, and shifted, slouching, so her head could lean against his shoulder. They were nearly of a height when they stood, but Anakin could see how they must have been when she was younger, in that moment.

They were quiet for so long that Anakin thought they were finished the discussion. The suns were rising. His exhaustion, temporarily set to the side, was creeping back. He glanced towards the door to the main house, and Ahsoka said, freezing him in place once more, “You care about him.”

Obi-Wan stiffened, visibly. He said, “Ahsoka, I don’t--”

“I’m  _ glad  _ that you do,” she said, talking over him. “He cares about you, too. A lot. I can tell and--”

Obi-Wan stood. She reached out and caught his arm, pulling to her feet while keeping her grip. “Everyone who gets close to me--” He cut himself off, the sentence just hanging there, frozen in the early morning air. Anakin could see Ahsoka’s expression, the way grief touched her face and shock, the way she drew back, a bit, before rallying.

“The Duchess,” she said, quietly, “she wouldn’t have blamed--”

“Don’t.” Obi-Wan pulled his arm from her grip, jumping off of the roof, radiating a hurt so deep that Anakin felt it. Ahsoka jumped after him. She stepped in his path, hands out to the side, like someone trying to gentle a beast that had spooked.

“Master,” she said, catching his arms, both of them, when he made to dodge past her. “It wasn’t your fault. No, it wasn’t, it… sithspit,” she said, the last louder, as Obi-Wan shook his head, hard, and pulled away, marching off into the sand, his shoulders shaking as he went.

Anakin stared after him, aching inside, Obi-Wan’s pain still filling up the morning air, and Ahsoka said, “I know you’re over there.”

Anakin winced. That was the problem with Jedi, he supposed. He stepped out of the shadows and said, “And how long did you know?”

She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Long enough. He would have sensed you, too, but…” She gestured after Obi-Wan’s retreating back.

Anakin sighed, approaching to stand near her. She had her arms folded, a troubled expression on her face. Anakin wasn’t sure if he had any right to ask or not. Probably not. But he’d never let that stop him before. “The Duchess?”

Ahsoka swallowed, gaze going to the ground. She scuffed her toe against the dirt. “Satine. Of Mandalore. They were… She loved him. He loved her, too. But….” She shrugged. Anakin could fill in the gap.  _ But the Order _ fit in perfectly. “And she… was killed. In front of him. He couldn’t do anything to stop it.”

“Kriffing hell,” Anakin breathed out. Each time he learned more about Obi-Wan, it was just more sadness.

“Yeah.” Ahsoka looked up, taking a deep breath. “But I thought you should know, that he can… he does, he feels--”

“Don’t,” Anakin said, though a part of him wanted nothing more than for her to continue. He didn’t want Obi-Wan’s secrets that way, whispered in the pre-dawn light, while Obi-Wan wandered the sands, mourning a love he lost, a woman  _ killed in front of him _ . He could wait until Obi-Wan wanted to tell him.

If Obi-Wan ever wanted to tell him.

Ahsoka nodded. She said, after a moment, “You look exhausted. You should get some rest.”

#

Anakin really thought, for a few days, that he’d get the ship all finished and they’d slip off world without any problems. So, of course, he was wrong. He still had a day or two of work to get the ship  _ really  _ space worthy, when the proximity alarms went off again.

Obi-Wan and Ahsoka straightened in sync with one another, though they were on different sides of the ship, working on some simple patch work. It was eerie, the way they stepped forward at the same time, like they were one person sharing two bodies for a moment.

“What is it?” Anakin asked them, grabbing his blaster and catching Rex’s eye. 

“Trouble,” Obi-Wan said, flashing him a look before stepping out the door. “Get your family. Hide them. Ahsoka and I will handle this.”

Anakin swore under his breath, a sentiment echoed by Rex, who grumbled, “Kriffing Jedi, they never change.”

Outside, the day was blisteringly hot. The air vibrated with heat, but not enough to obscure the ships approaching the homestead. It was a battered little flotilla, not GAR ships. “Mercs,” Rex said, checking his blaster at Anakin’s side. “Here for the bounty, no doubt. We need to get your people hidden,  _ now _ .”

And Anakin wanted to protest, but if hell was breezing into town, he couldn’t let his mother and the others burn on the flames. “This way,” he said, and turned on his heel, instead, sprinting towards the condenser sheds at speed.

His mother demanded, when he burst in, “What’s going on? Anakin?” 

“Mercs,” Anakin snapped. “Get into the chillers, now.”

“What--”

“ _ Now _ !” Anakin ordered, pushing when he did it, with his hands and his thoughts. Sometimes, he could make people do things, if he tried hard enough. His mother turned, dropped what she was working on, and started towards the chillers. Across the room, Rex was rounding up Cliegg and Owen.

Anakin took another look and scowled. “Where’s Beru?”

“She took Luke inside the house,” his mother said, expression flashing over suddenly to fear. “He was being fussy. Teething, she thought--”

Anakin wasn’t there to hear anymore. He jerked back out of the building, into the burning heat of the day and the sound of blaster fire and the thrum of lightsabers. He could see, through the buildings, flashes of blue and green. He smelled something burning and the unique stink of blood.

For a moment, he froze, the urge to run out there and put a blaster bolt through whoever was shooting at Obi-Wan rising in his spine. But he could hear Luke, crying. He swallowed, and sprinted for the main house, expecting to find Beru trying to calm a frightened infant.

There was a Gamorrean, inside the house. He had his hands on Beru, trying to yank Luke from her arms as she wept and clung to the child, her hair hanging around her face, stuck to her skin with blood. 

Anakin’s world got very small, very fast. He didn’t even think about raising the blaster and taking the shot, or crossing the room and shoving the Gamorrean’s body to the side, or wrapping an arm around Beru and saying, “It’s alright, it’s alright now, I’ve got you.”

She was shaking, weeping in his hold. Luke was wailing like a siren, loud and shrill. Anakin said, “Give him to me.” She kept her arms locked around the child, until he cupped her face and said, “Beru,  _ give him to me _ and get in the smuggler’s hole,  _ now _ .”

She stopped crying, all at once, and handed Luke over. She turned, still shaking, and walked down the hall. Anakin turned, lifting his blaster on an instinct from the back of his skull, pulling the trigger even as he looked, putting a blaster bolt right in the forehead of an ugly bastard trying to come through the front door.

“Sh,” Anakin told Luke, who had gone completely red in the face, expression screwed into fear. Anakin couldn’t take him to the others. He was screaming so loudly he’d lead the mercs right to them. He was certainly going to lead everyone directly to Anakin.

Anakin swore, stepping out of the main building. If he could get to the ship, maybe he could get her into the air. She had weapons, possibly they were even operational. Anakin ran across the sand, doding blaster bolts, feeling, abruptly, like he was in a podrace again, responding to things before they happened because if he didn’t, he’d be dead, and so would Luke.

The world got blurry, like everything else was moving slower than he was. He ran past Rex, standing near the entrance to the garage, and shoved Luke at him. Anakin was going to need both hands, to make this plan happen.

He slid into the cockpit of the ship at speed, dropping to his knees and reaching for exposed wires. He hadn’t been done. He wasn’t finished. Blaster fire cut across his concentration, screams filled the rest of the world. People were dying. He almost imagined he could feel it.

He shoved things into place, twisted wires, used every trick he knew and  _ felt  _ it the second before the engines came to life. He couldn’t spare the time to crow with victory, shoving up and into the pilot’s seat, hands on the controls. There was no time for a pretty exit. He barked, over his shoulder, feeling someone back there somewhere, “Hold onto something!”

Anakin had already thrown her forward, right through the wall, and up into the air. The morning was full of smoke and stirred up sand. There were speeders and smaller ships, scattered around the farmstead. Most of them were in pieces, but a larger vehicle was rolling up.

Obi-Wan and Ahsoka were everywhere down below, spinning and jumping, carving their way through a superior force in a way that made it clear why they’d been in charge of the war effort. Anakin caught a glimpse of Obi-Wan cutting his way through five people, and there was a strange beauty to the butchery.

There was no time to appreciate it. Anakin reached for the weapon’s systems, hoping they’d work, and laid into the tank approaching the farmstead, exhaling when the ship lit it up, leaving the tank a smoking ruin on the landscape.

Anakin  _ did  _ whoop, then, adrenaline crashing through his veins and into his head. Ahsoka and Obi-Wan had been doing fine, down below. With the larger vehicle out of the way, it should have been--

Anakin froze at the feel of something cold and metallic, snugging behind his ear. The mouth of a blaster. He glanced sideways and up, into a sneering face, a mouth too full of teeth. The man said, “Say goodbye, you son of a--”

And a blue blade  _ sliced the man’s arm off at the elbow,  _ the follow through stroke taking off his head, leaving a body in pieces to fall to the ground. Obi-Wan was there, then, shoving parts aside, demanding, “Are you alright? Anakin?”

He looked… amazing. Overheated, dripping with sweat, weapon in hand and hair in disorder, and Anakin had to clear his throat before he could speak, “I’m fine.”

Obi-Wan let out a breath, ragged, stretching out his hand to grip Anakin’s shoulder. He said, “I thought--” and cut off, looking to the side.

Anakin wanted to grab him, pull him down, kiss his mouth. But that would have to wait. He needed both hands on the controls, presently. He made a pass at what remained of the battlefield, but the survivors were fleeing. The entire thing had only taken a few minutes, somehow. 

Ahsoka was waving at him, down below, big sweeps of her arm, and Anakin took them down.

#

“We should go,” Ahsoka said, as soon as the ship was on the ground. She’d taken a hit or two, just grazes that left behind blaster burns on her skin. “Right now. Leave a clear trail to follow so they’ll come after us and leave Anakin’s family alone.”

“You’ve got your things?” Obi-Wan asked, as though that just settled it. He was still standing in the cockpit. Anakin stood, as well, and it brought them close. He felt hyper aware of Obi-Wan’s body, the trail of sweat down his neck, the fact that - after all of that - Obi-Wan didn’t appear to be breathing hard.

“Rex and I are set,” Ahsoka said, and even as she did Rex came up the ramp, Luke cradled in one arm, gumming on--

“Is that a blaster clip?” Anakin demanded, and it wasn’t what he’d  _ intended  _ to say.

“It’s empty,” Rex said, with a shrug. “And he likes it. I had to stop him screaming somehow.”

“Good thinking,” Obi-Wan said, reminding Anakin abruptly that every one of these people were insane and could not be trusted with themselves, much less the well-being of a child. Obi-Wan derailed the realization by looking up at him, raising an eyebrow, and asking, “Do you still want to go with us? It’ll be dangerous.”

“I’m coming along,” Anakin said, too full of adrenaline from the fight to be truly irritated by the insinuation that a little danger might turn him from his course. Obi-Wan had been nothing but danger, since the very first time Anakin saw him. “Besides, you’re going to need a mechanic to keep this thing together.”

Obi-Wan smiled at him, fast, like he was relieved, and Anakin could have gotten distracted by the sight of it, if his mother hadn’t come storming up the entry ramp at that moment, demanding to know what the kriff was going on.

#

Their goodbyes were brief. They had no choice but to be. Others would come. Mercs or troopers. “Tell anyone who comes to ask that we talked about heading further into Wild Space,” Obi-Wan said, arms folded under the hot suns, talking to Anakin’s mother and Cliegg. “We’ll make sure our trail matches what you’ve said. Tell them we made you help us.”

His mother frowned, glancing over their rangy group, her eyes dark and worried. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay here?”

Obi-Wan shook his head. “It’s far too dangerous for you if we stay.” He glanced at Anakin then, nodded a goodbye, and said, “Thank you for all you’ve done.” Obi-Wan kissed her cheek before he left, and Anakin had to watch his own mother blush pinkly.

“I’ll be back,” Anakin said, when she turned to him, expectantly. Everyone else was gathering supplies into the ship, moving quickly and with purpose. Her eyes dampened and she smiled at the same time, stepping forward to wrap her arms around him. “Mom…”

“You go and see the galaxy,” she said, her arms strong and sure around him. “See it all.” She pulled back, her hands on his cheeks. “I always knew you’d get out of here, Ani. You just needed to find the right reason to go.”

She pulled him down, kissed his forehead, and he couldn’t find the words to tell her how much he loved her, how much a part of him wanted to stay. He only held her, tight, until Rex cleared his throat and said, “We really need to get on our way.”

Anakin watched her through the hatch until it closed, shutting him into the inside of the craft. He exhaled shakily as it did, and Obi-Wan touched his arm. Anakin looked over at him, found his expression soft and sad. “If you want, you can still--”

“I’m where I want to be,” Anakin said, with a surety in his chest that felt deep and still. 

Obi-Wan wetted his lips, looking to the side. He said, “And you’re alright?”

Anakin snorted. “I can take care of myself in a fight,” he said, because he might not have a fancy glowing sword, but he had a blaster he knew how to use better than most. He frowned then, because as they rose through the air Obi-Wan winced, a hand coming up towards his ribs. “Are  _ you  _ alright?”

Obi-Wan waved a hand. “I’ll be fine,” he said. “I need to go make sure that--”

“Let me see,” Anakin said, catching him back. Obi-Wan was  _ always  _ trying to flit away, off to something else, when Anakin just wanted him to stay still for five clicks. He plucked at the front of Obi-Wan’s robes, and Obi-Wan sighed, shrugging them off one shoulder, revealing…

Ribs all mottled in purples and reds. “Sithspit, Obi-Wan,” Anakin grumbled, tracing careful fingertips over the damage, listening for little hisses of pain that didn’t come. He frowned up. “Are they broken?”

Obi-Wan flashed him a smile. “A few.” Anakin scowled at him, and he shrugged. “They’ll heal.”

He was an impossible, infuriating man. He’d fought half an army, jumped into a ship in flight, saved Anakin’s life, and then never mentioned the fact that he was walking around with broken ribs. Anakin was torn between wanting to shake him and wanting to kiss his smiling mouth.

His fingertips trailed down, off of the bruised skin; there was no sense in hurting Obi-Wan even  _ more _ . Obi-Wan sucked in a little breath, eyes darkening when Anakin’s touch curled around to his stomach, over muscles that jumped at the contact. Anakin looked down, watching his fingers move over Obi-Wan’s body, looking back up when Obi-Wan made a soft, sweet sound.

“Anakin,” he said, voice gone thicker, and Anakin shifted closer to him, watching his lips part.

“Master,” Ahsoka snapped, and Anakin would have thrown something at her head, if he had anything to hand. “We’re about to break atmo, you should hold onto something.”

Obi-Wan asked, “What?” sounding delightfully confused, and Anakin grabbed him, grabbed a handle on the wall, and held on as the ship jerked and shook. Something started making a terrible noise, as the shaking stopped, and Anakin swore, pulling away from Obi-Wan with regret to go find out what the kriff it was.

#

They each had a room on the ship. Anakin found his hours later, after making sure the O2 scrubbers weren’t going to catch fire and kill them all. He stepped into the empty space, looked at the little bunk, and felt, abruptly, terribly sick for the farmstead.

He shook the thoughts away, peeling his filthy shirt off and kicking off his pants, stepping into the little fresher. It was barely big enough to fit all of him at once, but he managed, and felt better for being clean. His clothes weren’t quite finished in the scrubber when he checked, so he sighed and sat on the bunk, considering sleep.

He should have been exhausted, by all rights, but his mind was humming along and wouldn’t be silent.

He was staring at the far wall, missing the noise of other people, missing all kinds of things, when someone knocked at his door. He checked the scrubber - still working - and scowled, grabbing the sheet to wrap around his hips and hoping, sincerely, that something else on the ship wasn’t breaking down.

Obi-Wan stood on the other side of the door, holding Luke, who was squirming in his arms. “He won’t settle,” Obi-Wan said, looking exhausted and harried; Anakin thought about his ribs and winced. “I think he’s - he’s used to you being there. Your presence in the Force.”

Anakin blinked and gestured back into his quarters. “It’s alright,” he said. “I’m used to him, too.” He reached out and took Luke, who abruptly started to laugh, reaching for Anakin’s hair. Obi-Wan sagged a bit; he looked right from the fresher as well, all cleaned up, but he’d thrown his old robes back on. Anakin looked away from him. “And you, Obi-Wan. My bunk’ll be pretty cold, without you in it.”

Obi-Wan flushed. Anakin watched the color climb all over his skin. He glanced at Anakin and seemed to actually see him for the first time, taking in his state of undress with increasingly wider eyes. The scrubber beeped, then, and Anakin stepped past him - brushing against him, there was barely any room in the bunk - and nudged it open. 

“Here,” he said, holding out the shirt, “wear this while we get yours clean, and then we’ll all get some sleep.”

Obi-Wan said, “I can’t take your things, Anakin, it’s--”

“Just  _ take it _ ,” Anakin interrupted, with a sharp look. “I’m not the one with broken ribs. You don’t need to argue every time someone tries to look after you, you know.” 

Obi-Wan tilted his jaw up, mouth open like he intended to go right on arguing, in fact, and then winced. “Fine,” he said, shrugging out of his robes and the bruising looked worse, come up over the past few hours. In places they were darkening to black.

It was a relief when he pulled on Anakin’s shirt, hiding them. And besides, Anakin had always liked seeing Obi-Wan in his clothes. He cleared his throat, turning aside to shove Obi-Wan filthy clothes into the scrubber. He said, his back turned, “You should do your healing trance thing.”

Obi-Wan made a little sound of disagreement. “I’m not hurt that badly. I need to stay aware, in case something goes wrong, so--”

“I’ll be aware, in case something goes wrong,” Anakin said, nudging him towards the bunk. “And you’ll be ready to handle whatever is going to go wrong next better if you don’t have  _ broken ribs _ . Come on.”

Obi-Wan always looked faintly confused when Anakin tried to take care of him. It never failed. But he climbed up onto the bunk, wincing a bit as he settled. “I’m not sure…” he started, and Anakin put a hand on his shoulder, pushing him down onto the pillow. The blanket would have to wait. 

“I’m sure,” Anakin said, and Obi-Wan huffed a laugh, but closed his eyes, asleep almost at once. “He’s so stubborn,” Anakin complained to Luke, who seemed half-asleep himself. Anakin bounced him a little, gave up on waiting for Obi-Wan’s clothes to get clean, and carefully climbed in beside Obi-Wan, curling around his injuries - and Luke - carefully and closing his eyes.

#

Anakin slept hard and deep, woken only a few times by Luke. Someday, apparently, the kid would sleep through the night. They hadn’t reached that point, yet. Obi-Wan slept through all of it, breathing slow and even, healing. He didn’t stir when Anakin crawled in and out of the bunk, or when Anakin watched him, after settling Luke again, and brushed his hair back.

Obi-Wan looked smaller when he slept. Like he took up more space just by being awake. He’d put on a little weight at the homestead, but his skin still stretched too thin over muscle. He still looked like a man who’d… well, who’d fought a war for three years with never enough resources at his disposal.

Anakin pressed a kiss to his temple, curled around him again, and slept until someone woke him by knocking on the door. He grumbled out a sound, stumbling up and away from the bunk, desperate to stop the knocking before it woke Luke. He pulled the door open and met Ahsoka’s eyes.

Her mouth was open, when he opened the door, like she was preparing to blurt out a message. It snapped shut. She looked down, it seemed almost involuntary, and her eyes widened all at once. Anakin woke enough to remember the sheet - currently wrapped around Obi-Wan, who had seemed cold in the night - and swore, half-shutting the door and standing behind it, before asking, “What?”

“What?” she asked back, her skin turning a darker orange. She was still staring in the general vicinity of his waist.

“What do you need?” Anakin asked, desperately wanting the chance to re-start the morning. “Obi-Wan needs to rest. He broke ribs.”

“You’re--” She shook herself, visibly, looking up, but not quite at his face. She stared somewhere over his shoulder. “I know he does. I would have let him complete the trance, if I could. But I think we’ve got a tail. He’d want to be awake.”

Anakin couldn’t disagree. He scrubbed a hand over his face and said, “We’ll be right there.” And then he shut the door, leaned against it, and resisted the urge to bang his forehead into the metal a few times.

And then he drew in a breath, got Obi-Wan’s clothes out of the scrubber, and bent to wake him.

#

It turned out that the reason Ahsoka wanted Obi-Wan awake was to shove him in the pilot’s chair. “Don’t we have a droid for this?” he complained, even as he took the controls, settling into place with the ease of long practice. “You know I hate flying.”

“Master,” Ahsoka said, buckling in to the seat next to him, “the tail.”

“I see him,” Obi-Wan said, and then, over his shoulder, almost absently. “You should hold onto something.”

For a man who hated flying, Obi-Wan did it almost absurdly well. Maybe that was  _ why  _ he hated it. Anakin braced through the mad moments that followed, keeping a tight grip on Luke through it all. They ended up taking the other craft out, taking only a single shot in return.

“You’ve gotten rusty,” Ahsoka said, as Obi-Wan turned them away from the battle with their maximum current speed. She was smiling when she said it, and Obi-Wan only snorted at her, rising out of the chair without a wince, though Anakin knew damn well his ribs weren’t completely healed.

“I’ll have to brush up,” Obi-Wan said, as though he hadn’t effortlessly danced around their attacker, leaving Anakin breathing faster than he should and with a hot ache low in his gut, want burning in his veins.

He wanted, desperately, in that moment, Obi-Wan’s hands on him with the same surety they’d rested on the controls. Obi-Wan jerked his head up, meeting Anakin’s eyes, and Anakin realized his emotions must be bleeding out when Ahsoka turned abruptly away and breathed out, “Oh, Force.”

“Engine is smoking again!” Rex called from further back in the ship, and Anakin pushed Luke at Obi-Wan, turned on his heel, and ran.

#

Anakin was getting attached to their bucket of bolts. He figured he had a right to it. It had to have a few gallons of his sweat and blood inside of it, now. It was like family. Family that wouldn’t stop breaking in new and inventive ways.

He pulled himself out from under the engine when he was confident it wasn’t going to blow up, and lay there on the floor for a while, just breathing, covered in grime and sweat. It felt late, though he’d lost all track of time, rolling slowly to his feet.

Rex had been around, helping him, earlier, before Anakin sent him away. He was picking up on emotions more easily, he thought, and Rex’s exhaustion had been distracting. He resisted the urge to rub at his face - his hands were covered in grease - and headed down the corridor.

He slowed at a feeling of tension and unease. Obi-Wan’s. It sped Anakin’s steps again. He moved forward with his hackles raised, worried that a mercenary had hidden aboard the ship, that they’d been infiltrated, that Obi-Wan was in danger and--

And Ahsoka was saying, “--can tell how you feel about him, too, you know. I know how much you care for him.”

They were in Obi-Wan’s quarters, Anakin realized. The door was open; Luke was making cooing sounds. She sounded tired and a bit frustrated. 

Obi-Wan  _ felt  _ tired and frustrated. Sad, a bit. He said, “The Order--”

“Is gone,” Ahsoka interrupted. “We have to accept that. We have to adapt to what  _ is _ , now. Or we really are going to be the last Jedi.” Anakin couldn’t see Obi-Wan’s expression, but could picture it, pained and lost.

Obi-Wan said, his voice thick, “And what if I do? What if I accept that we have to forge something new, Ahsoka? I’m…” he made a little sound, dismissive. “I failed Master Qui-Gon. I failed  _ you _ . I failed the Order, the Republic, I--”

“Master,” she protested, “you--”

“And you’ve seen him, Ahsoka. He  _ glows _ in the Force.” Obi-Wan sounded matter of fact. Calm. He  _ felt  _ agonized.

“Sure. And he’s obviously in love with you, so--”

Obi-Wan barked a laugh, just one, sharp and short. “Only because he doesn’t know any better. Once he’s out here, once he’s seen the galaxy, he--”

“ _ He _ should probably get some say in this,” Anakin interrupted, because the anger in his thoughts was probably about to give him away, in any case. He stepped forward, so he could lean in the doorway. “Don’t you think?”

Obi-Wan looked at him, expression shuttering. He said, “Anakin, I--”

“I do love you,” Anakin said, because it seemed important that there be no confusion on this subject. “Since the first time I saw you, mostly dead in your ship. It’s not something that’s going to change, just because we’re not on Tatooine.”

Ahsoka looked back and forth between them, took Luke, and slipped from the room. Anakin glanced at her as she left. Obi-Wan cast her a darker look, and said, “You don’t  _ know _ that, Anakin.”

“Yes, I do.” Anakin stepped forward. He couldn’t actually imagine not loving Obi-Wan anymore. Trying to remember what it felt like, not loving him, was impossible. The affection for him felt like a part of the make-up of Anakin’s being, irrevocably connecting them. 

Obi-Wan tilted his chin up, so he could continue to meet Anakin’s gaze as Anakin moved closer. He said, with a small, sad little smile, “You’re going to meet so many people, Anakin, amazing people, people who can--”

“Are any of them going to be you?” Anakin looked at him. His hands were clenched by his sides. He looked like a spring wound too tight. He glanced over Anakin’s shoulder at the door.

“No,” Obi-Wan said, “that’s rather my point, actually--”

“Then I don’t want them.” Anakin took his shoulders, one thumb brushing Obi-Wan’s neck. “Kriff them all. I just want  _ you _ .” He leaned down a little more. “I think you want me, too, Obi-Wan. Tell me I’m wrong. Tell me you don’t love me.”

He felt it, after all, clearly enough. Obi-Wan wetted his lips, hands still clenched at his sides, and said, “Of course I love you.”

Anakin couldn’t slow his breath. He stroked his thumb against Obi-Wan’s skin. He said, quietly, “Then be with me. Teach me about the Force. Raise Luke with me. Join a rebellion with me. Kriff, rebuild the Jedi Order with me, if that’s what you want. Just…”

Obi-Wan stared at him. He really thought Obi-Wan might slip to the side and flee the room again. But Obi-Wan shivered, instead, and said, “Alright.”

Anakin froze, almost doubting his own hearing. He repeated, quietly, leaning closer, “Alright?”

Obi-Wan’s mouth crooked into a smile, slow and sweet. He shifted, sliding his fingers into Anakin’s hair, pulling, not as hard as Luke did, and rocking up onto his toes. “Alright,” he repeated, and slanted his mouth against Anakin’s, kissing him with nothing but intent.

Anakin flailed a hand back towards the door controls, dragging his fingers across them as he pulled Obi-Wan closer. He listened to the door close with heady relief, because it meant he could get both hands on Obi-Wan, tilting his jaw, kissing him the way Anakin had wanted to kiss him for  _ weeks _ .

Obi-Wan made a hungry sound against his mouth, moving against him, all power and coiled strength. Touching him felt like touching one of Tatooine’s suns or an overloading engine. Dangerous and thrilling, all at once. Anakin shoved at his robes, yanking at clasps, pushing fabric aside to get at skin. He panted, “Your ribs.”

“Are fine,” Obi-Wan said, doing something with his shoulders that somehow dumped his robes off, leaving them hanging from his cinched belt. And his ribs were still bruised, despite what he’d said. Anakin avoided touching them as he slid hands across skin, Obi-Wan pushing into his touch, his clever fingers moving between them, working at Anakin’s belt.

He glanced up, blue eyes flashing, a smile on his lips, and Anakin said, “No, it’s still not my blaster,” and curled a hand around the back of his head, drawing him in to kiss him again. Obi-Wan smiled against his mouth, hands pushing under his shirt, over Anakin’s skin, sure and strong the way Anakin had always known them to be.

Anakin needed - needed all he could have, all at once. He pushed closer, yanking his shirt off, ignoring the grease on it for a moment. He felt a flare of guilt for smearing grease across Obi-Wan’s skin, but he didn’t seem to mind, seemed as desperate as Anakin, suddenly.

Anakin walked backwards, dragging Obi-Wan along to the bed. He sat when he reached it, hands on Obi-Wan’s hips to pull him down. Holding Obi-Wan across his lap was a heady feeling. So was feeling the proof that Obi-Wan wanted this, as much as he did. 

“Force,” Obi-Wan panted against his mouth, arms around Anakin’s shoulders. He shifted, grinding in Anakin’s lap. Anakin rocked up against him, helpless not to, curling an arm around Obi-Wan’s back, fingers curling into the hair at the nape of his neck, holding him. His other hand he slid between them, tugging at the clasps on Obi-Wan’s belt.

He managed to force the frustrating thing open, shoving it off and feeling Obi-Wan suck in a breath when Anakin slid his hand beneath fabric. Obi-Wan kissed him deep and filthy, open-mouthed, panting, as Anakin touched him, fingers curled around him, Obi-Wan’s hips moving in tight little jerks.

Anakin wanted to do everything, all at once, but things had been building between them a long time. It wasn’t a surprise when Obi-Wan shifted, pressing his face against Anakin’s neck, breathing raggedly. 

His muscles moved and shifted, all down his back, across his stomach and shoulders. Anakin had watched him do impossible things, had seen him move like a weapon, and held him through it, when he thrust into Anakin’s grip and came, gasping and panting for breath.

Anakin pulled him up, needing to kiss his mouth while he was still shaking in the aftershocks. Obi-Wan had gone pliant against him, holding on when Anakin shifted, needing, desperately, to get him down on the mattress. Obi-Wan kept shifting his grip, holding tight while Anakin shoved at his kriffing pants - why was he wearing kriffing pants? - and sank down against him.

There was something heady and electric about stretching out over Obi-Wan, his elbows on either side of Obi-Wan’s shoulders, bodies sliding together, skin pressed to skin. His cock slid through the mess on Obi-Wan’s stomach, across all that pale, perfect skin, while Obi-Wan arched up, trying to kiss his mouth, his hand fisted in Anakin’s hair.

Anakin wanted to sink into him, drown in him in every way possible, but that would have to wait for another day. He rolled his hips, grinding down, gut getting hot and tight for a moment before he lost control, and slumped, panting, down against Obi-Wan, who slung an arm around him and held him close, nuzzling against the side of his head.

Anakin’s chest felt too tight to breathe, for a moment. He almost couldn’t believe they’d actually ended up tangled together. He shifted, pressing a kiss to Obi-Wan’s shoulder, and then another, and he got lost, then, in the softness and sweetness of Obi-Wan’s skin, all the controlled power inside his bones, all curled against Anakin.

#

Rex smirked, the next time Anakin saw him. He glanced over from the pilot’s seat and raised an eyebrow, and Anakin stared back, in far too good of a mood to care. “Have a good night?” Rex asked, and Anakin shrugged, looking out over the stars streaming past them. Rex laughed.

The rest of the trip passed in a blur for Anakin. He snagged moments with Obi-Wan whenever he could, and never got over the thrill of touching him, of having the chance to kiss and hold someone who felt like the Force itself. Obi-Wan was lightning and war and serenity, all at once, and Anakin got to put hands on him, hold him close, kiss him. 

The fact that Obi-Wan looked at him like he was trying to engrave Anakin into his memory sometimes, like he was just waiting for Anakin to turn and walk away from him, never stopped stinging, but Anakin figured he understood.

Obi-Wan had lived a tragedy.

But, sooner or later, he’d have to accept that Anakin wasn’t going anywhere.

It took them time to find the rebels. The rebellion wouldn’t last very long if they were easy to locate. They made their way through different systems, different planets, helping where they could. And, finally, they ended up on a small outpost on a small moon, welcomed to land by people who didn’t sound sure at all about giving them permission.

They ended up in a cramped hangar, one full of ships of all different makes and models; most of them looked ready to fall to pieces. There were people waiting outside their ship, when they put down the ramp, a ragtag bunch, none of them wearing the same armor or holding the same weapon.

Obi-Wan took a breath and made to step forward, drawing his back straight, and Anakin moved with him, standing at his side when Obi-Wan said, “Hello, there. We’ve been looking for you a long time.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can also find me over on tumblr [right here](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/glimmerglanger).
> 
> I've also received some lovely art by @whtaccntisnttkn, over on twitter! Check it out!
>
>> For glimmerglanger's AMAZING fic Nor the Suns Themselves Brighter. This scene is one of my faves -- Obi is a bit playful and probs sunburnt. Nervous about posting this (haven't done fanart for a decade, but fuck it)   
>   
> Implied [#obikin](https://twitter.com/hashtag/obikin?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)  
>   
> Rec: <https://t.co/v9BJWLK4A3> [pic.twitter.com/hI0odSjxD3](https://t.co/hI0odSjxD3)
>> 
>> — whataccountisnttaken (@whtaccntisnttkn) [June 18, 2020](https://twitter.com/whtaccntisnttkn/status/1273601032434733056?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Repairs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25514440) by [leela1414](https://archiveofourown.org/users/leela1414/pseuds/leela1414)




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